Life After Death
by Alexabee
Summary: [Reposted] After the Victory Tour, Katniss and Gale go through with their plan to escape into the woods. But in order to protect the lives of those they've left behind, they must fake their own deaths. When all they have left is each other, they learn that life after 'death' is not what they expected. Canon divergence inspired by the movie Blue Lagoon.
1. Chapter 1: Running

_Author's Note:_ This story was originally posted in April/May 2012. It was inspired by the fabulous/fabulously cheesy 1980 movie 'Blue Lagoon', in which two children are shipwrecked on a tropical island and have to come to terms with puberty, death and sex as they grow up in an isolated environment and fall in love with each other. I loosely adapted this sort of scenario to the world of The Hunger Games and even borrowed some situations and lines directly from the movie. I 'remixed' other lines and themes from THG and included them in here as well. This is a canon divergence that begins during Catching Fire after the Victory Tour. It is rated M for explicit sexual content and depictions of PTSD/violence that may be disturbing to some.

* * *

**Chapter 1: Running**

The little concrete house near the lake smelled like oranges. I remember it well.

Oranges were something of a novelty, a treat, especially in the dead of winter in District Twelve, but I could afford them now that Peeta and I were victors. I had been peeling one, eating it section by section as the juice dripped down my fingers. Gale, however, had just taken the fruit I brought him and turned it over and over in his hands. At the time I'd thought that maybe he was offended by my expensive gift.

"Well?" I huff, arching my eyebrows questioningly at him. He was the one who asked me to meet him this afternoon, and he still hasn't explained why we are here. I know it isn't to hunt. We are here to talk. Nevertheless, I have my bow and he has his, just in case we do come across a wild turkey or something.

"Well..." Gale stands, paces, looks out the door, then paces again. I've never seen him this nervous before. "I figured out how we could do it. How we could run."

He stops pacing and gives me the strangest look, then takes both of my hands in his. Mine are sticky.

"I think I know how we could pull it off and still keep everyone safe," he says.

I stare at him in shock for a second, then sputter, "What? How?"

"We have to convince them that we're dead."

My shoulders sag. He actually had my hopes up there for a second.

"Gale, how on earth-"

"Listen," he rushes on. "Just listen. There's no way we could run with both our families and... Haymitch and Peeta." He says the last part spitefully, like it tastes bad in his mouth.

"Gale-"

"Right? There's no way. We've decided that already. It'd take a lot of convincing, and I don't think we'd get away with it. Especially not if Peeta's family has anything to say about it."

He looks resentful for a moment, but then opens his eyes expectantly, almost frantically at me, prompting my response.

I sigh.

We had this conversation last time we were here - about running, I mean. It had been my idea, originally, but we reasoned out that there were too many problems with it and we hadn't spoken of it since. I was under the impression that Gale had wanted to stay and start a rebellion in District Twelve, and I had resigned myself to inevitably being crushed under the giant boot that is President Snow on any given day. So I'm at a loss as to where this is all going.

"You're wrong about Peeta's family," I counter, though I'm not so certain of that, myself. "But sure. Okay. How would we convince the Capitol that we're all dead?"

Gale swallows hard and grasps my hands tighter. He's really acting strangely. I narrow my eyes.

"No. Not the Capitol. We would have to convince our _families_ that _we_ are the ones who are dead. _You and I._ Then we could do it."

We're both silent for a minute, searching each other's faces. I try to process the implications of what he's saying.

"Have you lost your mind?" I finally ask, incredulous. "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard of!"

"Think about it," he presses. My wrists are starting to hurt, he's holding them so tight. "We'd never convince them all to run, not realistically. And we couldn't escape alone and just leave them behind, either. They'd be unprotected."

"Which is exactly why it's not an option!" I interject, like it's the most obvious thing in the world.

"But if we didn't run, Katniss, if we were _dead_ as far as our families or anyone else knew, then there would be no threat to them. No one would be looking for us."

Gale chooses his words carefully, but my blood still runs cold. I know what he's really trying to say. It's what Snow confronted me about that day at my house - I'm dangerous. I've caused problems by fanning the flames of an uprising. If everyone thinks I'm dead, I would no longer be a threat to the Capitol's total power and, subsequently, a threat to the safety of the people I love.

I'm the threat that needs to be removed.

Peeta would be sole victor of the 74th Hunger Games. Since Snow didn't buy our so-called engagement during the Victory Tour, that would probably his next best plan, anyways - knock me off and present the whole relationship as an inevitable tragedy. But if I were 'dead', Prim and my mother would have to move back to the Seam, and who would take care of them then?

"Katniss?"

I snap back to the reality of what Gale is saying.

"It's what the Capitol wants, isn't it?" His voice is thick with contempt for Panem's government. "Wouldn't our deaths come as a welcome accident? We'd just be helping them out."

"Stop saying '_our'_," I snap. He's not saying what he really means, which is uncharacteristic of him and grates on my nerves. "You mean _my_ death. They want _me_ dead."

"Snow wants me out of the picture, too," he says bluntly, "You told me yourself. Why else would you have asked me to run with you?"

I look down at my hands, still clasped in Gale's. The last time we were here, talking about running away, he'd confessed his love for me.

"If I could just give Snow what he wanted, you would be safe again and you wouldn't have to," I say quietly. I swallow hard. "I could run for it by myself and save you a lot of trouble."

"No! I already told you, your plan is crazy but I'm coming with you."

"Whose crazy plan is it now, huh?" I ask. "Faking our deaths sure wasn't _my_ idea! You do realize that it would mean that we'd never see anyone ever again, don't you?"

"What are our other options?" Gale counters quietly. "If we stay, they're going to kill us, who knows in what horrible way. If we run, the others are targets because Snow will think they have information on us. But if we're dead as far as anyone knows... he can't hunt down people who are already dead, Katniss! If they want us dead, let's give them dead! There's at least a chance that we could all actually survive this way. Your mother, Prim... even Peeta. But this is how we have to do it."

Gale must be really trying to convince me if he's playing the empathy card in Peeta's name, given how upset he was when he first heard the news of our engagement.

"Gale, I..." but I don't know what I'm trying to say. I sigh. "I'm too tired to think about this right now."

He releases my wrists but grabs my shoulders instead and leans in close to my face.

"There's not time to think about this. There's not time to just wait and see what happens. We need to do this now. If you love any of them, this is the best option," he says firmly. His eyes are shiny and he looks like he's on the verge of tears.

"You know I love them," I say in a hurt voice, offended.

"Then they can't know a thing. They have to really think we're dead. They can't know anything that would put them at risk. It will hurt them at first, but it will save us all in the long run. We can do it."

"But I can't leave Prim," I protest.

"If you let her go, they can't use her against you or you against her. It's the only way to make sure she's really safe."

I'm silent for what seems like a long time, and only one thought keeps running through my head.

"I knew they had to have their victor," I finally mutter.

* * *

"So how do we do it?" I ask flatly. Even though Gale explained the reasoning behind his plan, I'm still not convinced that we could actually pull it off.

"We burn down your house," he says, so casually it's almost scary. "The one in Victor's Village. With everyone thinking that we were inside."

He's kneeling down, roasting some chestnuts over a small fire he has built. We're a ways from the cabin now, having walked halfway around the frozen lake while I'd grilled him with questions and tried to figure out the details of his plan. He talks about destroying my house so easily, the same way he talks about hating the Capitol, and it bothers me a little.

"So, we move all of my mother's and Prim's things back to-"

"No, that would arouse suspicion. We'd have to take our chances that some of the stuff could be saved and just let the whole place burn."

"Are you kidding!" I spit, my protective instincts swelling up inside my chest. He doesn't even look up to acknowledge my tone and just keeps expertly roasting the nuts.

"I'm dead serious. No pun intended."

"Ha ha. Not funny," I mutter. I pull my cold hands up inside the sleeves of my father's hunting jacket and kick around a hollow chestnut shell. "And just how are we supposed to convince my mother and Prim not to be inside, without _arousing suspicion_? Just take our chances and let them burn, too?"

Gale looks at me like I'm crazy and says in a frustratingly calm voice, "No, Katniss. We can't plan out where they should be and then realistically convince anyone that the fire was an accident. We'll just wait until they both happen to be out of the house at the same time."

"Oh, like they were this afternoon?" I ask sarcastically.

"Just like this afternoon," he responds, in all seriousness.

"Who's to say when that'll happen next? I thought you said we had to act before it was too late?"

Gale says nothing.

"You really are a mastermind at creating death traps, you know," I puff, my breath creating a cloud on the cold air.

He's ignoring the chestnuts now and just watching my face, giving me one of those wordless looks that we normally exchange. I usually catch on to his meaning immediately, but this time I'm at a loss for what he's trying to communicate.

"What?" I say, frustrated. When he still doesn't answer, I continue. "And I suppose we're both just going to come out here with only the clothes on our backs, so it's not _suspicious_?"

"That would be stupid," he says bluntly, turning back to the chestnuts, "but we couldn't take much. Just enough, just until we can find a place near running water where we could build some kind of permanent shelter."

"We wouldn't just live in the house by the lake?" I motion over my shoulder, to the location we had walked from.

"Too close to the District," Gale says gruffly. He offers me a hot chestnut, which I juggle between my hands then pop into my mouth when it's cool enough to eat. It still burns my tongue.

"We're hours away, it's hardly close," I mutter. I position my boot over the chestnut shell I've been kicking and crunch it, then drop down to sit on Gale's oversized game bag. The thing could fit a whole deer. I'm surprised to find that it's lumpy and half full, which is odd because we haven't been hunting.

"Hey, what's in your bag..." I start, when suddenly all of the pieces fall into place.

My whole body turns to ice.

_I am so stupid._

I don't have to keep debating whether or not Gale's plan will work - he's already put it into motion. We are running right now. And I'm sitting on our stash of supplies.

"Gale?" I stare at him, alarmed. "When you asked me to meet you out here this afternoon..."

He turns to face me and returns my horrified look with one of steely determination.

"Gale, what have you done!?"


	2. Chapter 2: No Choice

**Chapter 2: No Choice**

"_How could you?_" I scream, beyond horrified.

"I knew you would take convincing but that you would ultimately see it's the only way." Gale speaks in a slow, steady voice, like he's talking to a child. "I couldn't risk telling you earlier. It needed to happen quickly and it needed to be believable, Katniss. No goodbyes. No stashing stuff. I only brought the basics."

Silence.

"Prim," I finally choke.

"There was no time," Gale says. I can tell from his tone that he's trying to keep me from panicking. It isn't working.

"My house... you already..." I swallow, my mouth dry. "My mother?"

"Stay calm. I made it look like a gas leak. There was an explosion. But they are fine. We will be fine."

I didn't get to say goodbye. _I didn't even get to say goodbye._

Gale reaches out to touch my arm and I bolt to my feet. A scream rises up in my throat like bile, but it chokes me into silence. No, no, no, this isn't happening. Not already. Not like this.

"I changed my mind," I tell him. "We're going back. I changed my mind."

"Katniss, it's already done. They already think we're dead. We can't go back."

"I'm not ready," I insist.

"We can't go back," he repeats firmly.

"No!" I protest, anxiety flooding all my rational capacities. "You got to- to prepare for this! I didn't! I'm not ready! I want to go home!" Tears fill my eyes. I turn myself around, trying to figure out which direction we'd come from, searching for a hint of horizon, but we're surrounded by trees and haven't been taking any discernible path. It's quickly getting dark. I pick the most likely direction and begin to walk, but Gale easily catches me by the elbow.

"Katniss! Listen to me! It's done! We can't go back now."

"_You knew!_" I suddenly scream, finding my voice and wrenching my arm out of his grasp. I hit him in the chest but he barely flinches at my small fist. "You planned it and you didn't ask me first! I didn't get a choice! I didn't-"

"Katniss, calm down. None of us have had a choice. Ever."

His voice is cold and hardened, but it's not directed towards me. I know he's thinking of the mines. Of our fathers. Of the Games.

"_Peeta!_" I wail, as if I were back in the arena. It makes no sense and I know he won't hear me, but it rings out from me like some kind of survival instinct. "_Peeta!_"

"Shhh!" Gale says, trying to calm me, grabbing me roughly by the wrists and pulling my body close to his.

"I need Peeta!" I scream at him. I don't know where that came from or why it took me up until this point to realize that it's true. Peeta is the only one who is actually safer with me around. "If we just get married, if we try harder to look like we're in love, it's what the Capitol would want! And you- you would be safe! And everyone would be safe, and-"

"Katniss!" Gale shouts in my face, shaking me. "You don't actually believe that garbage, do you? They would never leave you alone! Never! No matter what you did!"

He's right, I know. But I can't make sense of anything and I don't want to believe what's happening.

"Let me go!_ Let me go!_" I yell, over and over until I'm hoarse, but Gale holds me tightly.

"Katniss, breathe," he is repeating, but I'm screaming over top of his commands. Or, rather, hyperventilating. Everything is spinning. No intelligible words are coming out of my mouth at this point, just gasping sobs. Gale's iron grip on me is my anchor, but I lash out at him with everything I can, all knees and elbows and teeth. I headbutt him in the chin, which I think only serves to make my head hurt more than his jaw, but it doesn't matter. Nothing matters. He's taken away my choice, my family, my life-

No, not Gale. The Capitol. President Snow. They've-

My frantic train of thought is interrupted by a sudden numbness to my cheek and a ringing in my left ear. I stagger a bit and clutch my face, stunned into silence. Gale has slapped me. Hard. He offers no explanation and no apology.

"Stop it," he hisses. The forrest seems to sway and all I can hear is my own heartbeat racing in my ears.

At first, Gale looks like he's about to say more, but then he doesn't. Maybe he's given up on reasoning with a hysterical person. I stand there dumbly for a while, clutching my tear-stained cheek and gasping. Then, leaning down and wrapping an arm around the back of my thighs, he suddenly hoists me up, throws me over one of his shoulders and starts walking. I grunt as the wind is knocked out of me. After the initial shock wears off, I punch him hard in the back.

"Put me down!" I scream. "Damn you, Gale!" I try to kick him, one foot making contact with his ribs. He lets out a small 'oof' and steadies himself, then stills my legs in one big hand and continues forward at an even quicker pace. Farther away from the cabin. Panic fuels my anger. "Stop! Let me go! I want to go back!" I shriek, punching him again and again in the back, tears of humiliation at my helplessness streaming down my face. He doesn't acknowledge my blows and continues to walk, gripping the backs of my thighs roughly. The uneven forest floor whizzes by at a dizzying pace beneath his feet. I'm beginning to feel sick, dangling half upside-down with the constant jiggling pressure of his shoulder digging into my stomach.

"Gale, Gale, stop," I wheeze, finally hanging limply over his shoulder, barely getting the words out. "I ca-n't breathe, I'm gon-na puke, stop!" He continues to ignore me, and the ache beneath my ribs grows more intense. My nose is congested from all the crying and I'm having a hard time drawing breath. "Ple-ase," I manage, pulling at his jacket. My head buzzes and my arms go numb as I inevitably vomit wetly down his back.

At this, Gale finally stops and unceremoniously heaves me to the ground. The freezing stillness underneath my back is comforting by comparison to being hauled around. My head reels and my vision momentarily goes black.

When my eyesight fades back to normal I see Gale twisted around, inspecting his soiled clothing. Then his gaze levels on me. I can't bear the frustration on his face. I think he expected something better from me. More _fight_, more _survival_ _instinct_. But all I feel is helplessly lost. So I avert my eyes and look straight up into a tangle of tree branches, gulping air into my lungs. It all looks familiar yet unfamiliar at the same time. This isn't my forest. Tears stream from the corners of my eyes into my ears. Embarrassed, I close my eyelids and concentrate on the sound of my own breathing.

"Katniss," Gale eventually says, but he doesn't sound angry. Just tired. I hear him kneel, feel him press a small handful of wet snow to the side of my face. I flinch. Right. He had hit me there. I'd forgotten. There's probably a mark. "C'mon, Katniss. Get it together. We have to do this. You have to do this."

Rage boils up in me as I prepare to hurl insults at him. How dare Gale tell me to get it together after _he's_ the one who burned down my house and tricked me into leaving Prim behind! But when I open my mouth, all that emerges is a low moan. I shove his hand away and lift my head just in time to vomit again, this time onto the frost-covered fronds of fern. Sick is already all over my mouth and nose from before and my stomach aches.

"It was the only way," Gale says in a gentler tone, his hand on my shoulder, pushing me gently back down to the ground. My head connects with something soft he has placed there. "Just rest for a second, okay?" He smoothes my hair away from my dirty face with his hand. "It was the only way, I'm sorry... I'm sorry," he repeats.

"Then let's go back," I choke, the tears flowing freely now. Since he is so sorry, he should take us back. "You know the way."

Gale's lips form a straight line.

"We can't." He says. "They think we're dead. If we go back, they'll kill us for sure, for running. For lying."

I close my eyes.

"Katniss? They'll punish everyone."

Prim. Peeta. Gale. I could get us all killed if I were to return now.

Everything is silent for a moment, save for a steady dripping noise that I can't place. I can almost forget where I am, who I am. I can almost pretend that I am safe.

"We can't go back," Gale says quietly, with finality, and that is it.

* * *

After that, Gale lets me walk. I stay ahead by a few feet, deliberately ignoring him while setting a purposely slow pace, even though he seems anxious to get as deep into the woods as possible before allowing us to stop. I hear him sniffle behind me a few times, but I've never known Gale to cry and I'm too furious to care if he is now.

We end up camping out underneath an outcropping of rock that night. He manages to find enough dry wood to build us a fire and roast the rest of the chestnuts he'd gathered. I sit nearby on top of the game bag, mute and hypnotized by the flames, with my knees curled to my chest underneath my father's hunting jacket. At some point, I pass out. I awake halfway to see Gale adding more wood to the fire. He then molds the length of his body to my back and heaves a blanket over us. I drowsily wonder where it came from before drifting back into a dreamless, black nothingness.

When I awake again, it's lighter out. The fire is smoldering and I am actually sweating. It's surprisingly hot, between the blanket and the heat radiating off of Gale's body beside me. The hunting jacket is laid out over top of me, on top of the blanket, though I don't remember taking it off.

I flinch at a tickling trailing up my arm. Turning, I see that Gale is awake, running his fingers along my shoulder. His eyes meet mine, but he doesn't say anything, and I'm glad for it. 'Good morning' wouldn't be appropriate.

His grey eyes look sad. I immediately feel awful. Gale has left behind his family, too, of course. This mess is all my fault. I was the one put the idea in his head to begin with. He never would've been in danger in the first place if it wasn't for me.

"Where did you get the blanket?" I ask quietly, my first sane words to him since the day before.

"Game bag," he replies simply. I hadn't even thought of checking out what he had brought. He'd just slung the bag over one shoulder and me over the other and walked.

"Is there food in there, too?" I inquire after some time. After all, it is winter. Hunting isn't exactly easy right about now.

Gale looks at me strangely - sadness mixed with something else.

"I brought enough," he finally answers, removing his fingertips from my arm and standing up, taking the blanket with him. My jacket falls from it and crumples around my feet. I shiver at the sudden loss of Gale's body heat quickly put it on, crouching next to what remains of the fire before finally standing and stretching my legs.

It still doesn't feel real, this whole running away thing. But Gale's sad expression haunts me, and I resolve to be more cooperative for his sake. Besides, there is no other option. He is right. Our best chance of saving everyone in the long run means having to hurt them by leaving them behind - or, more accurately, by letting them think that we are dead.

I should've died - _really_ died - when I was in the arena.


	3. Chapter 3: Blue Lake

**Chapter 3: Blue Lake**

For a while, Gale and I survived in the little outcropping of rock with two log 'walls' built against the wind and cold, but within a couple of days we had moved on to a different spot, more concealed by the dense woods and closer to fresh water. Gale began chopping wood to start building us a little cabin that same day. It was completed soon thereafter, being only one, small room with four wooden walls, no windows (we had to make economical use of the few real nails he had brought in the game bag) and a door with a latch. We built it underneath a jutting cliff of rock above, flanked by a dense growth of evergreens on either side, which made it pretty much covered and therefore waterproof, but we coated the roof with mud and moss anyways to fill in the cracks. We even built a little stone hearth with a basic chimney so we could easily cook indoors and keep warm at the same time.

Just outside the door we dug a pit a few feet deep, then fashioned a trap-door cover for it and placed a large rock on top to hold it closed. It served as our pantry and, being underground, kept our food pretty cold. We ate whatever we hunted, along with the different types of berries, mushrooms, nuts and greens that we gathered. We also fished from a little stream close by. At one point, after it had begun to thaw outside, we even walked for a few hours and found a grove of apple trees. I made a mental note to return come summer, when their branches would be heavy with ripening fruit. Nearby, we overturned some wild potatoes and turnips and from what must've once been a farm. The root vegetables were knotted and dry, having somehow survived the bite of winter, but they were still edible when cooked up as part of a soup.

Although I was mad at Gale for the first few weeks and barely spoke to him as we worked together by day, I clung to his familiar, warm shape every night. Modesty and privacy were not priorities and sleeping curled up together quickly became natural. I had never been this far into the woods before and he was all I knew. At first we barely slept, always half-awake, waiting for hovercraft to come after us. But surprisingly (to me, at least), none did - or if they did, they never found us. We finally began to sleep with a degree of confidence that we'd actually pulled it off and the Capitol truly believed that we were dead.

Sometimes, when I had nightmares, I momentarily thought that I was safely nestled in Peeta's arms before fully regaining consciousness. Gale didn't know how to cope with my thrashing and was patient in a stoic sort of way, but he seemed detached and confused about how to comfort me. I simultaneously resented him for not understanding my experience in the arena, and resented myself for holding it against him when it wasn't his fault. So I clung to him and never bothered to explain my terrifying dreams.

In the game bag, Gale had packed some clothing, the blanket, a length of rope and a few tools and cooking utensils, among other things. We didn't have much in the way of food at first, and I wished he had informed me of his plan before getting me into the woods so I could've at least gone out and bought us some supplies. But if I had known, I probably never would've gone through with it in the first place. So all I had were the clothes on my back, my own small leather bag, my bow and quiver of arrows, and the oranges. I had also been carrying a roll of gauze and some peppermint candies that I'd traded for at the Hob and had been intending to bring home for my mother and Prim that same afternoon that we ran. I held on to these objects for months, hidden away, never looking at them or using them. Their presence alone was a comforting and painful reminder of home.

Our cabin door opened up just a stone's throw from the mouth of a clear, glassy lake that lay between two picturesque mountains. It was glacially cold and no good for bathing, but it provided us with an immediate source of fresh drinking water. I later found a smaller, shallower turquoise-green pool in the opposite direction, hidden between two steep cliffs and surrounded by trees. This smaller lake warmed up just enough to be a comfortable, refreshing place to swim and bathe throughout the spring and summer months. Gale and I referred to the large, glacial-fed body of water generically, as 'The Lake', but we called the smaller, hidden pool 'Blue Lake' because of its jewelled hue.

I often swam at Blue Lake in the late morning after hunting. It was something to do, besides survive. I suppose I'd been suffering from depression or something like it since leaving everyone behind. I think Gale was feeling it, too, because as much as we'd been coping just fine, physically, with our combined hunting skills, there was an unspoken sort of emptiness that loomed over us. We missed our families and friends. We were discovering that survival was not the same as living. And life together wasn't what we had planned. I taught Gale how to swim and we checked the snare line together, but other than that we didn't share the same camaraderie as before. All too often we simply sat in silence before the fire, ate whatever we had, then collapsed into bed in exhaustion. We'd cling together for the night, then go our individual ways the next morning. And he hadn't tried to kiss me once since that day long ago, back at the District fence. Maybe he just didn't love me anymore.

Swimming in Blue Lake took my mind off of the depression and the loneliness. It also took my mind off the constant nightmares. Usually they revolved around abandoning Peeta while a mutt that drooled blood and reeked of roses chased me down. Even in the dream, I instantly regretted leaving him and screamed his name as I ran. Then I'd wake up and have to face the fact that I'd done exactly that - I'd disappeared and made Peeta's worst nightmares come true. Holding my breath and floating weightlessly underwater was the only escape I had from the heavy burden of guilt that threatened to crush me each day.

Guilt is exactly why I'm here this morning, gliding silently through the water. I duck my head under the surface again and again to drown out the thoughts before they drown me.

Underwater, I hear a muted, plunging splash from somewhere behind, and know that it must be Gale coming to join me. I pop up and wipe the water from my eyes, waiting for him to emerge. He does, only a couple of feet away.

"Hey," I say, sounding casual, but I'm surprised. We're both nude. The time for caring about clothing has long passed since we've lived, slept and even scrubbed ourselves down together in the same one-room cabin for the past six months. But that's not why I'm surprised. I'm caught off guard because Gale hasn't joined me in the water much lately. Sometimes I see him watching me from the shade of the trees as I float around, and once he sat on the bank with his pants rolled up and his feet submerged. But he seems to enjoy swimming alone now. Maybe he does it to clear his mind, like I do.

"Hey, Catnip," he says quietly. Something is clearly different if he's calling me by the nickname he gave me years ago. We paddle and tread water in circles around each other silently for a few minutes. "There's some food inside," he says, finally breaking the silence.

"Okay."

Then all of a sudden, Gale's lips are on mine. They're as warm as the water is cool, and I'm momentarily disoriented. We bob together awkwardly for a few seconds, lips fused. Then I break the kiss and flounder backwards into shallower depths until my feet find purchase on the smooth stones below.

"What..." I begin, but Gale has already closed the distance between us and I'm rendered speechless. He wraps his arms around my waist and pulls me into him. He's tall enough that the water hits him mid-chest whereas I'm barely staying afloat on my tip-toes. I'm used to the feeling of his lean body pressed to mine, but not when we're both naked like this.

"I couldn't just watch you anymore," he says, struggling to find the right words. His eyes travel between my eyes and lips and he squeezes my body close to his. "I've watched you every day." His hands move down my lower back and cup my bottom, and then he pulls me legs up around his waist. I'm shocked to feel his hardness pressed against my lower stomach. He gets a strange look on his face, like a hunter spotting it's prey. I've never been scared of Gale before, not even when he's been on one of his angry rants about the Capitol, but I am now for some reason. He leans in to kiss me again.

"Don't!" I say, pushing his chest away before I even know what I'm saying or doing. He looks at me indecipherably as I try to pry myself out of his arms, but a second later his grip goes slack and he lets me splash away. As I scramble out of the water, I look back over my shoulder at him. Gale is still standing chest-deep, watching me. I feel a stab of shame and embarrassment for running away. I should probably apologize or explain or something, but mostly I just don't know what I want at all. What just happened?

I curl my knees up to my chest and sit on the bank, picking at a tuft of grass as Gale continues to stare at me. He's seen my body before, but I somehow feel more naked than ever. Eventually, he turns away and climbs out of the water, onto the opposite bank. He keeps his muscled back towards me the whole time and walks off into the woods without saying anything at all.


	4. Chapter 4: Pure

**Chapter 4: "Pure"**

When Gale finally returns to the cabin, it's almost dark out. I've been lying on our bed in the corner - a surprisingly warm pallet of pine needles and pelts covered by a sheet of soft animal skins and our blanket - trying not to panic, thinking that he was never going to come back, or worse, that he had been torn to bits by a pack of wild dogs. It's surprisingly easy to panic when you've survived the arena and now have only one friend in the world, who then goes leaves you alone in the middle of nowhere. Then it's just you and your neurotic, messed-up brain.

"Hey," I say, sitting up quickly. "Where were you?"

Gale looks at the pot of rabbit stew that I've made and begins to take off his shirt and pants. He hangs them by the fire without answering me or making eye contact, then puts the game bag down in the corner. Something is in it, but judging by the sound it makes, it's definitely not game. Probably fruit or something.

"I made rabbit stew, if you're hungry," I suggest. Obviously. He looked right at it.

Gale sits on the edge of the bed nearest to my feet and begins to eat straight from the pot.

"Where did you go? I was worried," I try again.

He swallows, sighs.

"Just go to sleep, Katniss," he says.

"What's the matter?" I ask. It's a stupid question. I know exactly what's wrong, I just don't know why I did it or how to make it better. Gale finally looks over his shoulder and glares at me a little.

"Leave me alone."

He turns back to the pot and mutters something as he takes another bite, but all I hear is "...stuck here with you."

"What did you just say?" I ask. _Stuck here with me?_ All of a sudden my stomach feels like it did that time I fell out of a tree. For some stupid reason, tears begin to prick at the back of my eyes. I lay down and turn to face the wall, swallowing the lump in my throat and forcing my shoulders to remain level so Gale won't notice that I'm crying.

* * *

Sometime in the night, I awake to the feeling of someone stroking my hair. The remnant of the fire casts a dim, reddish glow throughout the cabin.

"Gale," I croak, hoarse from sleep. The hand in my hair freezes. I'm about to ask what he's doing when I reconsider and shut my mouth instead. My mouth has only gotten me into trouble today. I really am terrible with words.

Without explanation, Gale lifts himself up on his elbows and leans over me, brushing my lips lightly with his - not really a kiss so much as just hovering above me. We're barely touching and his eyes are pinched shut, as if it's painful for him. I can feel his soft, warm breath against my mouth. It has the effect of making me really want a kiss, so I press my lips up to meet his. At first he doesn't respond and I feel the hollow pain of rejection. Then he exhales loudly and pushes his mouth firmly against mine, coaxing it open and dipping his tongue between my lips. In my drowsy, relaxed state it feels nice, and I welcome it without question. His hand travels from my hair to my collarbone, then down to my breast. He cups it lightly through my thin undershirt, then squeezes gently, deepening the kiss at the same time that his leg crosses over to settle between mine.

Then all of a sudden, he breaks away. That strange look is back on his face, but he doesn't kiss me again. He looks down at his hand on my breast before releasing it and lying back down on his side of the bed.

"I'm sorry," he whispers. I think he's talking about earlier.

"Me too," I say.

Then he rolls away and murmurs, "Goodnight."

Maybe I don't know what he's talking about after all.

I watch the steady rise and fall of his back for a few moments before I softly reply, "Goodnight."

* * *

The next morning, Gale is gone before I even wake up. I figure that he's probably out hunting alone, although I do notice that the game bag is still on the floor in the corner. Curious, I peer inside - apples. Small and green and tart, but delicious nevertheless. There's also a few carrots, but they're not orange like I've seen before. They're a pale shade of yellow and all twisted-looking. Interesting. I remove them from the bag and put them in our underground pantry, then decide to go for my ritual morning swim at Blue Lake a little earlier than usual, since it's shaping up to be a hot day. I take off my underclothes and leave them on the bed, then undo my braid and walk barefoot to the swimming hole. Along the way, I pick a handful of sun-warmed blackberries and pop them into my mouth.

When I first arrive everything appears to be the same as usual - glossy, turquoise-green water secluded between silver cliffs and tall trees. But just as I toss the remainder of my berries into my mouth, I hear the sound of water splashing and something else I can't identify. My eyes snap to attention and I scan the area, eventually locating the back of Gale's head and shoulders in a shaded, shallow pool near the other edge of our Blue Lake. At first I'm relieved - then confused. He's leaning against a rock with one hand, facing away from me, and I can tell by the movement of his shoulder that his other hand is moving against his body. His head dips forward for a moment and he hisses in pain.

"Gale!" I yell, before thinking. It's only when he snaps around in surprise and he quickly sinks into the water up to his neck that I realize it wasn't a hiss of pain after all. I also become horribly aware that I'm standing on the shore completely nude, save for my long hair covering my shoulders and breasts. Gale is gaping at me, face flushed. The whole situation is ridiculous.

"Uhh, are you ok?" Am I always that squeaky sounding? I'm suddenly glad that I undid my braid this morning as I attempt to hide behind my hair like it's a curtain.

"I- yeah," Gale sputters back, uncharacteristically fazed.

I'm oddly aware of my own breathing. I shift my weight from foot to foot and hear Gale clear his throat. He casually glides through the water for a few seconds before I can't bear the awkwardness any longer and bolt back to the cabin. I immediately wrap myself in the blanket to remedy the embarrassed, exposed feeling, then sink down onto the bed, mentally kicking myself for screwing things up and running away. Again.

Just as I conclude that Gale will not forgive me for two back-to-back days of awkward rejection and will probably disappear all afternoon once again, he walks through the door. We stare at each other for a second before I bury my face in the bed.

"Go away!" I cry.

There's a silence for a moment, and I steel myself for a fight. But then Gale begins to laugh. My head pops up.

"Why are you laughing at me?" I demand. Gale's laughing gets louder and less controlled as he sinks down next to me.

"You're- you're so-" He chokes. "You're just so... _pure_."

"I am not!" I insist, a split second before realizing how ridiculous I sound. "I'm not- what is that even supposed to mean?"

Gale just continues to laugh, collapsing next to me. I begin to roll away from him, but he stops me and pulls me back so that we're both lying on our sides, facing each other.

"Hey, I'm not laughing at you, really, you're just... oblivious," he says.

"I'm not. About most things," I add quickly.

"But you are when it comes to sex," he grins. "It's cute."

"I don't know which half of that statement to be more offended by," I say, at a loss for any kind of comeback. Gale just laughs, softer this time, and plays with a strand of my hair. "Hey," I suddenly realize. "I haven't heard you laugh in a long time."

"Yeah. Feels good," he finally admits. "Thanks, Catnip, I knew you were good for something."

We stare at each other in silence for a moment.

"Do you resent me?" I ask quietly. I know Gale was joking just now, but his words reminded me of what he'd said last night.

"What?"

"Being here with me, _stuck with me_," I clarify. He stares at me for a minute, then realizes what I'm referring to.

"No," he says. He moves his hand from my hair to my cheek. "No," he says again, firmly, "I didn't mean that. Don't listen to me."

He looks like he's about to say more, but instead he surprises me by suddenly leaning in to kiss me. His hand travels back to grip my hair and tightens, pressing our lips together even more. When he breaks the kiss, he pauses for breath, then whispers against my mouth, "I love you."

Gale maneuvers our bodies so that I'm pinned beneath him. I free my arms from my blanket cocoon and lightly hold onto his sides. I'm worried for a moment that he can see my hesitation, but instead he continues talking.

"Sometimes you just seem so far away."

I stare at him, still unsure of what to say, so I do the only thing I can think of and catch his mouth in another kiss.

"I just want you closer," Gale murmurs into my lips when we break apart for air, kissing a trail along my jawbone to my ear. "I know you're here, but I wish you were closer. To me." His lips connect with my neck and I sigh in pleasure. I close my eyes and when I open them, his face is above mine again.

"It's just us out here, Katniss," he mumbles, brushing my hair away from my eyes. "We're all we've got, now."

My chest aches.

"Okay," I breathe. But I don't know what he wants, exactly, or if I am even able to give it to him. He seems to know a lot more about what he's doing than I do. His head dips to my neck, then my shoulder, and then he's back to sucking on my bottom lip. It feels so good that it makes my head spin.

"Yeah?" He asks, breathless.

"Yes," I answer, although I'm not entirely certain of what I'm agreeing to.

"Oh, Katniss," Gale groans, pressing his lips to my breastbone, then scattering kisses across my chest. I inhale sharply. I hadn't even remembered that I was still topless. He tugs away the blanket that I've bunched around my body like he's unwrapping a present, then sucks one of my nipples into his mouth. A tingling sensation shoots through me, causing me to arch up against him. A small whimper escapes my lips, and I weave my fingers his his hair, holding him there. Gale turns his attention to my other breast, the light stubble of his face scrubbing against my skin and making the soft, wet movements of his lips all the more wonderful by contrast. His big, calloused hand cups the side of my ribcage, then trails its way down the curve of my hip. He pauses for a moment at the band of my underwear, lips still sucking gently at my nipple, then pushes his fingers underneath the fabric and covers me completely. His skin is hot against mine, and I shift my hips at the new sensation. He begins to rub me with one thick finger. I gasp again.

"Tell me what feels good," he mumbles into my skin, pressing hot kisses down the flat of my stomach, then to my inner thigh as he tugs the garment down my legs and gently spreads them apart.

"Oh..." I exhale softly, closing my eyes as Gale begins to do things with his mouth that make me twist and moan and shudder beneath him. Just when it feels like I can't take it anymore, he rises up above me, fingers still buried deep inside, and tells me to say his name.

I do.

"Tell me you love me," he demands next, but his eyes are soft.

"I love you," I gasp out.

I open my eyes afterwards to see him licking his glistening fingers clean. I reach down and wrap my own hand around him, eager to bring him the same pleasure that he just brought me. Gale groans and buries his face in my shoulder, bucking into my hand and looking down between our bodies to watch what I do. His fingers weave into my hair and he breathes heavily into my ear. He's hard and hot and, shortly thereafter, throbbing as he spills into my palm.

Surely Gale knows he's not the only one who I love; I ran with him because I wanted to protect so many people, all of whom I love desperately. But he can have my love in this way if it helps us keep the loneliness at bay.


	5. Chapter 5: The Fight

**Chapter 5: The Fight**

I don't remember the details of the dream, but I wake up remembering the scent of fresh bread. It's been so long.

Gale is awake, too, staring at me. My cheeks are wet and I realize that I've been crying in my sleep. He finally breaks the silence.

"You were saying his name."

I begin to cry afresh, because these dreams about Peeta, about home, are common. But I've never admitted that to Gale. I don't want him to think I don't appreciate all him or all he's done. Swimming and - more recently - kissing have kept the anxiety and depression away during the days, but nights are still haunted territory for me.

"I miss home," I finally admit.

"_His_ name," Gale emphasizes, ignoring my statement, sitting up and glaring down at me. As if he's blaming me for doing it on purpose. As if he's my boyfriend and is entitled to be possessive.

As if I even had the choice.

"I miss him! I miss all of them! I can't help it," I spit. My self-control suddenly snaps and everything I've kept inside comes flooding out. I blame Gale again and again for all our hardship and for taking me away from everyone I loved. Even though I can hear the words coming out of my mouth and I know they're not entirely true, I can't seem to stop them. "I didn't choose to be out here, and I don't choose what I dream about! Or do you have to decide _that_ for me, too? What are you even jealous of, Gale, _you have no competition!_ None! Anywhere! It's only us out here, _remember_?"

Gale's face is red with rage as he hovers over me and I immediately wish I could take my words back. I've seen him mad a thousand times before, but I've never been the one to provoke it like this. And it's scaring me.

"I did this for you!" he finally explodes, just inches away from my face, making me wince. Then, unexpectedly, his fist comes down hard against my cheek. He hits me, then hits me again, then lifts me up by the straps of my undershirt and shoves me back down roughly onto the bed, as if reconsidering whatever he had been planning to do next. It makes my neck snap and I try to scream, but it comes out as a choking gasp instead. I can't catch my breath. I can't cry. I can only watch as Gale continues to rage.

"You think I _like_ being here? You think I _wanted_ to leave my family behind? All of this is for _you!_" He jumps up and kicks at the charred remains of the fire, sending up a cloud of ash, then begins throwing every object he can get his hands on. I hear rather than see the recipients of his abuse - the clatter of my bow, my hunting jacket being whipped at my feet, the remains of last night's supper hitting the floor. I hear the sound of wood cracking, but I don't know what it came from. Air finally rushes into my aching lungs and I let out the bloodcurdling scream that has been trapped inside, followed by another, before breaking down into gasping sobs.

Gale has never hit me before, besides that one time I was getting hysterical. When he finally turns back to me he keeps his distance, but is still trembling with anger. His fists ball up then unclench, then ball up again, like he can't decide what he wants to break next. It's far scarier to be attacked by someone you know than by a stranger in an arena.

"Stop! Stop!" I sob, holding the side of my face. It feels like my eye could be permanently damaged and I'm frightened to remove my hand in case it is. It's numb and I can't see.

"It's your damn fault we're out here! You! You would be dead without me," Gale spits, but tears are coursing down his cheeks. These last few months, the isolation and the bare survival, they've taken their toll on us both. We're at our wits' end with each other.

I cradle my head in my hands and curl up on my side, crying in earnest. Not so much from the physical pain, but because Gale's blunt words confirm everything I've blamed myself for since the games - this is all my fault, I've ruined everyone's lives. I'm a murderer. I'm toxic. I can't stand myself. I clutch my eye and sob, wishing I could escape my own body, because living in my own skin disgusts me. Tears and mucus cover my hands and even though I'm bawling it seems like there's an excess and it's stickier than it should be. When I finally look, I see that it's blood. It's pouring from my nose, reminding me of my crimes, staining everything. I don't even care. I bury my face in my hands once again and wail. Everyone I love thinks I'm dead, and the one person I still have has just confirmed how worthless I've suspected myself to be all along. I have nothing left to lose.

I eventually cry myself into exhaustion. The blood stops flowing from my nose on its own and dries against my face, neck and hands. At some point Gale must've stormed out of the cabin because he's nowhere to be seen. I didn't hear him exit over all my sobbing, but he's left the door wide open. Emotion will hit me, eventually, but for the moment I lay on my back and stare straight up at our cabin ceiling, overcome by so much guilt and regret and self-loathing that I end up in a sort of haze where I can't feel anything at all. Maybe it's my brain's way of coping.

Finally, the hot pulsing of my bruised cheek takes over and prompts me to drag myself out to the lake. I go to the big lake, not Blue Lake, because I know the iciness of the water will numb my injuries. It will numb everything else that needs to be numbed, too.

I stumble along the shore until I find a nice deep spot. There's no grassy bank here, just a steep drop dotted with jutting boulders. The water is so clear that I can see straight to the bottom, a good ten or fifteen feet from the rock I stand on. Without even taking off my undergarments, I wearily step off the edge and plunge in. The cold invades my mouth and nose and shocks me out of my daze. My eye throbs, but then my whole body numbs almost instantly. I let myself float up to the surface, take a shuddering gasp of air, then force myself back down.

It's nice and quiet underwater, like my ears have been packed with cotton.

Peaceful.

I wish I could stay down here forever.


	6. Chapter 6: Sickness

**Chapter 6: Sickness**

When I return to the cabin, Gale still isn't back. I'm relieved. My stomach is tied in knots after the ordeal and I have no desire to eat breakfast. I'm sure now that my eye isn't permanently damaged after all, but it is nearly swollen shut. The blanket on our bed has a dried patch of blood on it the size of a dinner plate. I am shivering and want to wrap myself in it, but the sight of the stain is unsettling, and I can't seem to co-ordinate my hands well enough to clean it. Everything just feels fuzzy.

Instead, I crouch by the hearth and make a halfhearted attempt at building a fire. I absentmindedly pile the salvageable bits of wood that Gale had stomped on in his rage, but give up before I even attempt to light it. I stare at my ash-stained fingers. _Coal dust?_ No, I'm not thinking clearly. The swollen lump on cheekbone where Gale hit me feels hard as an egg when I brush my fingers across it. I sit down in the corner, in the dirt, and curl my knees into my chest, letting my hair drip icy water down my back.

I have no sense of time and don't recall falling asleep, but when I wake up I'm lying on my side and my hair is caked with mud. My face aches anytime I move my head. The fire I built remains untouched. I go to the open door and find that it's damaged - that must've been the cracking sound I heard during our fight. It surprises me to look outside and find pale, watery morning light filtering through the trees. I must've slept through most of yesterday and right into the night without stirring once. And Gale still hasn't come back.

I force myself not to think about it and try to keep busy instead. A little break from him would be nice, and I still feel like a zombie anyways. The first thing I should do is get the dried mud out of my hair, but my stomach lurches in protest, demanding food. I eat a few bites of one of the tart, green apples from our little pantry - which hurts my face to chew - then strip the bloodied blanket from the bed and make my way towards Blue Lake. Once there, I wash the mud out of my hair the best I can, then wash the blanket as well as my underclothes. I walk back to the cabin stark naked, only realizing once I've arrived that I left my underwear drying on the rocks. My apprehension over what to say to Gale upon returning to the cabin had taken all my attention and I'd completely forgotten about anything else.

It turns out that it didn't matter - he's still not back.

I manage to light the fire I had built yesterday and hang the damp blanket nearby to dry. After warming myself for a moment, I return to Blue Lake to retrieve my underclothes. On the way back, the forest seems to spin. I lurch into the trees and lazily vomit into the dirt. That unripe apple didn't sit well.

I return to the empty cabin and wrap myself in the still-damp blanket, then collapse onto the bed. My stomach churns and I feel dizzy. I drift off to sleep far too easily, then wake up shivering so hard that my teeth chatter, even though it's summertime and I can usually sleep comfortably without a blanket.

I stumble to my feet and notice that the fire has gone out. Then I look out the door and find that it's pitch black, save for a sliver of moon in the sky.

I managed to sleep all day, once again - and still Gale has not returned.

Biting back my worry, I build another fire, wrap myself in the blanket once more and lay on the ground right in front of the hearth, though nothing seems to stop my shivering. As sleep tugs at me once again, a few tears leak from my eyes.

"Come back," I whimper, though there's no one there to hear me.

* * *

When I wake up, I'm too weak to go to the door and check what time of day it is. My head feels like it's packed with cotton, sort of like when I was underwater. It suddenly dawns on me that I have a fever, which was obvious before, now that I think about it, but in my haze of anxiety I don't think I had realized it.

"Gale?"

I croak out his name, but my ears are buzzing and I can't tell if there's an answer. I'm sweating, but I'm cold. My mouth is parched, but getting water seems like too difficult a task right now. So I close my eyes and drift back into an empty sleep.

* * *

I fade in and out of murky dreams, none of them pleasant, not sure of how long this half-awake, half-asleep state lasts. It only feels like a few minutes, but when I register that Gale is lifting my head, encouraging me to drink some water from a battered blue cup I've never seen before, I can tell from the worry on his face that I must've been out for a while.

"I'm ok," I say, my throat scratchy.

"You're not," he counters. "Drink more. Good."

"I can see again," I say deliriously, to no one in particular.

Suddenly, I'm on the bed. Gale must've moved me. "Don't leave," I beg, reaching for him. "Stay with me."

I see him take my hand, but I can't feel it. I'm floating. He says something in reply, but I'm not sure what. My vision fades out and sleep pulls me under once again.


	7. Chapter 7: Penance

**Chapter 7: Penance**

I'm mysteriously sick for about a month, though neither Gale or I really know what is wrong with me. It comes and goes, and I only vomited that one time after eating the unripe apple. Some days I feel well enough to eat the food that he brings me or walk with him to check the snare line, but then I only end up bedridden again for the next day or two, feverish and sapped of energy. My mother would be able to figure out what's wrong with me and fix it, I know. I don't voice that thought, though, for fear of speaking of home and making Gale angry again. I don't cry anymore, either.

We have never outright addressed the fight we had, neither of us being exactly great with words. I just assumed his return meant everything was alright between us again - or if it wasn't, I guess my illness made us both realize afresh the weight of what he had said before.

_It's just us out here, Katniss. We're all we've got now._

Gale cares for me tenderly each day that I'm sick, hunting and cooking for the both of us and dipping into our woodpile more often than usual to ensure that I'm warm as I lie in bed. One day, he knocks down a beehive and snags us some honeycomb (only getting three stings in the process) and uses some of it to make me a honey and mint tea. It's the sweetest thing I've tasted since we've been out here in the woods. At night, he protectively wraps his arms around me while I sleep, even though sometimes I know he stays awake, keeping vigil. I think he's haunted with guilt over walking out and leaving me alone in such a bad state, and he feels responsible for my poor health. Frankly, I just think my body is punishing me for all the rotten things I've done.

In my mind, I deserve it.

Gale patiently bathes me every few days. When he was gone he came across a dilapidated old farm house a good few hours away and brought back a number of items that were hardly damaged at all, including some dishes, a hammer, an oil lamp with an intact wick, a comb (which he presented to me as a gift in such a shy, romantic way that it took me by surprise) and a smallish tin wash tub. I can fit in the tub snugly if I bend my knees, but he has to sit on the side in order to bathe. I watch from the bed as he painstakingly heats up pot after pot of water over the fire, filling the tub and making sure it's a comfortable temperature before undressing me and lifting me into the warm water. He seats me inside, supporting my frail form and sponging me down with a scrap of old clothing when I'm too weak to lift my own arms to wash myself.

Gale talks about the farm house and the evidence of old crops and orchards with a touch of relief in his voice, as if it has proven that it's possible to really live and thrive outside of District Twelve rather than just eke out a scrappy existence like we've been doing. He sounds energized and hopeful for the first time. I find myself a little jealous of that hope. Guilt is my close friend, not hope.

"There were some clothes in there, too," he muses one late summer night as he bathes me, rinsing my body with a cup. "Some were hardly burnt at all. I'll show you where it is when you're feeling up for it. We can bring back a lot of stuff. I just couldn't carry it all myself. Sit up, I'm gonna wash your hair now."

Gale is behind kneeling me, his chest pressed to my bare, wet back, supporting my weight. My head feels heavy as it lolls back on his shoulder, even though I know I've lost a lot of weight.

"I'm sorry," I say quietly. For being such a burden. Yet another thing he has to carry all by himself. I think we both underestimated how hard this life would be.

"Hey," he says, gently pouring a cup of water over my hair. His big, capable hand catches a stream on my forehead before it can get into my eyes and smoothes it back over my head. "Don't do that." He means I should stop apologizing. His fingers find my jaw and he kisses my cheek, then my wet shoulder, before returning to his task.

This absolves me of some of the constant guilt I live with and I instantly feel a little lighter. I also realize that it's the first time he's kissed me in a while. And I've missed the physical affection.

Gale eventually finishes picking the tangles out of my hair, hooks his forearms under my armpits and lifts me out of the little tub. He dries me off with one of his own shirts as I stand weakly in front of the fire and feebly try to wring out my hair with my hands. Then he kneels to dry my legs and feet, and I find myself staring down at the top of his dark head, holding on to his shoulders to steady myself. The picture gives me a sudden surge of affection for him.

"I'll give you a haircut soon," I think aloud, running one of my hands along the top of his head and ruffling his hair, "I promise."

Gale looks up at me. His face is filled with concern, which confuses me.

"You ok? Do you need to lie down?" He asks. I shake my head, but it must've been something in the tone of my voice that worried him because he whisks the blanket from the bed and forces me to sit down on it in front of the fire as he continues to dry me.

"I'm okay, really," I protest, though I do feel a little lightheaded. He pulls a soft, long-sleeved shirt over my head and guides my arms into it. It's my only whole shirt now, and even it has holes at the cuffs and armpits. It hangs on me like pajamas.

"Shh," he says, taking the little comb he'd brought me and very, very gently, pulling it through my dark locks. "I'm almost done. I can't braid it like you usually do, but-"

"Gale," I interrupt, turning my head to look at him. He's surprisingly concentrated on combing my hair. The tiny, feminine comb with its rosebud detail looks strange in his scarred hands. He's moving dexterously and carefully, as if setting the most delicate and precise snare. But the comb makes it such an unusual sight that I laugh weakly, which finally catches his attention. I must sound a little bit crazy. Maybe I am.

"Gale," I repeat, suddenly tongue-tied. "Will you... can you..."

"What do you need?" he interjects, concerned. I feel another rush of affection, looking into his attentive eyes. My cheeks suddenly feel hot.

"Katniss?"

"Make love to me?" I say in a small voice, almost a whisper.

Gale stares at me in silence for what seems like a long time, his lips just slightly parted, the comb still in his hand. Finally, he looks away.

"Katniss, you're..." I know he's going to say no. That I'm sill too weak, or too sick, or that I'm not thinking clearly.

"Please?" My voice wobbles.

Gale gently puts down the comb. His eyes lock on my face. He looks concerned and awed and riddled with guilt, all at the same time. A hundred words pass between us just in how we look at each other, without a single one needing to be voiced.

I might be ill, but I'm determined.

He cups my face lightly in both his hands.

"I don't deserve you," he says, so quietly that I barely hear it. Then he kisses me. Softly at first, pulling back to search my face for any sign of distress. There must be none, because deeper, passionate kisses shortly follow.

"The bed?" I say breathlessly and he nods, still cupping my face with both hands. He then stands and lifts me up, carrying me in his arms as if we were newlyweds crossing the threshold.

Gale moves to lie down next to me, but I stop him while he's still kneeling by putting my hand on his chest. He looks at me quizzically. I brush my fingers along his taut stomach and trace the little bit of dark hair that trails from his bellybutton downwards. He's not wearing a shirt and his own chest is still damp in patches from bathing me. He waits patiently for what I plan to do next. I try to sit up but have a bit of trouble, so he has to put an arm behind my back to help. Other than that, he lets me take control. I lean in and kiss his hipbone, just above the waistband of his pants. He exhales audibly.

Even though my body is weakened from sickness, I feel energized from being able to do this to him. It makes me feel alive for the first time since the fever. I slowly untie his belt and pop the button on his pants, tugging them down just a little bit. He loops his thumbs in the fabric and lowers them another few inches to help me out, then weaves his hands into my damp hair. He doesn't direct me in any way, but I still lean in and kiss the front of his shorts. I feel him twitch slightly beneath my lips, and his hands tighten in my hair. He's already hard, so reach inside the slit in the fabric and pull him out. Gale's skin is soft and hot and smells warm and familiar to me. I grip him and look up to see that he's watching me with a tiny smile. I kiss the tip of his length and his eyes roll back before fluttering open and staring down at me once more. Curiously, I kiss him again, this time parting my lips a little bit and sucking the tip into my mouth.

"Katniss," Gale shudders above, his fingers digging into my scalp. It turns me on, knowing that I can make him feel good. I grip the fabric of his pants as I take his length slowly into my mouth. Gale is breathing hard through his nose, his hands sliding down the back of my neck, across the tops of my shoulders then back up into my hair, as if he can't figure out where to rest them. I can tell from the gasps that escape his lips and the tension in his body that he's trying hard not to push himself deeper into my mouth.

"Oh, Katniss," he's breathing, over and over again, fingers tightening in my hair, then releasing me, then tightening again. I hum in appreciation, which causes him to moan aloud and buck forward softly, just once, before he pulls out of my mouth and places his hands firmly on my shoulders, guiding me to lie down on the bed.

He's right. I am still weak, and that's about as much exertion as I can take. But I need him to know how much I really do love him.

"Please?" I whisper once more as he hovers atop of me.

Gale's eyes look a little wild. He nods, then kisses me deeply. He shifts his pants downwards a little more and pushes my soft, worn-out shirt up to my collarbone, exposing my breasts and giving us more skin-to-skin contact. Then he slides his arms up under my shoulder blades and cradles the back of my head as he positions himself between my legs. We rub slickly against one another for a few moments before he finds the right angle to enter me, and then I feel hard pressure as he pushes inside. There's no pain once he's completely buried, but the inward thrust and outward slide feel strange. I'm unaccustomed to the fullness. I cling to him and take pleasure from his presence, his weight on top of me.

Gale hitches one of my legs up around his waist and then slides his hands back under my head. He kisses me on the lips lightly, over and over. It's not frenzied, like the first time we touched. This time, everything is slow and gentle. There are no words, only breaths and soft sounds of pleasure being exchanged between us. He moves with a measured rhythm right up until the end, the depth of our kisses increasing as our passion grows. Then he presses deep inside of me and goes completely still. We stay connected together like that until our breathing returns to normal.

Gale bundles me to himself, repositioning my arms so that I'm comfortable on my side. He looks blissfully tired as he slowly strokes his palm in circles over my hip. His gentle attention towards me these last few weeks has been his penance and apology for our fight - asking him to make love to me was mine.

"Is this real or not real?" I ask before his touch lulls me to sleep. I'm not sure if what I'm feeling is the afterglow of our lovemaking or just the byproduct of some feverish delirium.

"Real," he confirms.


	8. Chapter 8: The Discovery

**Chapter 8: The Discovery**

True to his word, Gale and I make the trek to the old farmhouse once I'm feeling stronger. He even holds my hand as we walk, our relationship having transformed in some unspoken way since we started making love. Our time together is no longer filled with tense silence, but with easygoing conversation. With our walls down, we now feel free reminisce about times back in the district or to talk about our families. When the memories are painful, we allow each other room to grieve without blaming one another or ourselves for our current circumstances. It's taken us nearly a year, but it seems that we are finally getting the hang of living together. We're actually happy.

Gale and I take a path close to the stream and stop periodically to drink and cool off. He picks a handful of purple and white wildflowers for me at one point, sneaking up and kissing my neck as he tucks one bloom behind my ear. I smile, which causes the sunburn on my cheeks to tingle. It's a hot and dry autumn that we suspect is lasting late into the year, but we're already stockpiling wood and root vegetables for the winter. Hopefully we will find some things in that farmhouse that will be of use as well.

When we arrive, the first thing I find is a mummified cat under the collapsed, worm-eaten porch.

"No way," says Gale when I point to its shriveled, grey form. "Wonder how long it's been there. Look, you can see its teeth."

The house itself is partially burnt and looks to be about a hundred years old. That means that it was probably firebombed during the Dark Days, back when people actually lived in this area. The parts of it that aren't charred black consist of crumbling, rotten wood. A good chunk of the roof has caved in, and the inside is overgrown with weeds as high as my hip. But the land surrounding it has healed from its trauma, and the house yields some treasure as well.

As we gather useful things to bring back with us - mostly kitchenware, fabric and shoes (which we sorely need - I rip the thick soles out of the impractical or ill-fitting pairs we find just so we can re-sole our hunting boots) - I come across a heavy trunk in what was once the master bedroom. Inside is a dusty but well-made patchwork quilt which we could definitely use. I also find some old-fashioned mens' shirts that Gale can wear, or that we can cut up and use as washcloths, towels or sheets. There are no pants, so we will have to wear ones that we make of animal skins, but I do fortunately find a box of buttons in an old dresser drawer, which will make the task of sewing clothing a lot easier.

I spy a sumptuous, yellowy-white pile of fabric at the bottom of the trunk and dig it out. It's an old wedding dress, perfectly preserved except for its discoloration. It's lace and something else. I try to remember what Cinna showed me and tentatively decide that it may be satin. Gale comes up behind me, holding a dust-covered radio with a fat battery hanging out of its bottom by a red wire.

"Put it on," he suggests.

"Does that thing even work?" I ask, nodding to the contraption in his hands.

"Probably not. Are you going to put on the dress?"

"I don't know. Seems kind of... personal." Besides, I don't have any practical use for a wedding dress.

I put the thing back in the trunk and poke around the rest of the room as Gale returns to whatever he had been doing with the radio. There's a smashed picture frame on the ground, lined with mildewed glass, but the picture inside has long ago been destroyed by the elements. The closet is filled with the dense tangle of a dead bush that had tried - and failed - to grow upwards through the floorboards. The iron bed frame remains, though the mattress has sagged violently in the middle and the bedding is moth-eaten. In one corner is a small stack of yellowed magazines that I think are called _National Geographic_, but they are so damaged that they fall apart when I try to pick them up. Both of the windows lack panes of glass, and the remnant of a tattered curtain blows softly in the breeze. I can hear crickets chirping outside in the field, as well as inside, where they've lodged within the walls. The bedroom door is no longer on its hinges, but looks like it is because it's jammed up between the wall and a sagging ceiling beam that once held up the roof but now just reveals a patch of blue sky. However, as I walk by, something behind it catches my eye. I easily pull the crumbling panel of wood out of the way and find myself staring into another pair of human eyes.

I'm so startled that I fall backwards, landing hard on my wrist and bumping into the wall.

"Gale!" I scream.

"Katniss?" I hear a crash followed by heavy footsteps as Gale rushes back into the room. "Are you okay?"

He stops near my feet looking panicked, then follows my line of sight to see what has scared me so badly. He startles, too - though not as severely as I did - taking a step back.

"Oh my God," he says in a low, awed voice, frozen on the spot.

We both remain completely still for what seems like an hour, staring at our discovery.


	9. Chapter 9: Reflections

**Chapter 9: Reflections**

"You found this?" Gale asks.

"Yes?"

I mean to reply to the affirmative, but it comes out sounding like a question. I'm too distracted. I can't tear my eyes away.

It's a dirty, full-length mirror with a long, led-black crack up its middle. Otherwise, it's intact.

It's also the first time either of us have really seen our reflections since last winter.

Gale pulls me to my feet after we get over the initial shock and we stand together, side by side, examining ourselves.

We look wild, dressed in rags. My skin has been significantly browned by the sun, and freckles I didn't know I had stand out across my nose. I'm far too thin - scarily so - and I look sort of bug-eyed as a result. Next to my darkened complexion, the grey of my irises seem almost blue. My eyebrows are thick, my cheeks burnt, my lips chapped. My hair is even more unruly than I imagined and falls over my shoulder in a messy, matted braid. The once white undershirt I had been wearing the day we ran is now dirty and stained. It hangs loosely from my emaciated frame and is frayed all along the bottom; I've been wearing the sleeveless garment as outerwear all summer.

Gale's appearance is familiar and comforting to me, and far less jarring than my own since I see him every day. But I can tell that he's struggling to reconcile himself to his own reflection, too.

It's just plain weird.

I turn back to the mirror and tentatively lift my shirt. I see dirty fingernails running up a flat brown stomach, then too many ribs. I drop the shirt and shake my head a little. It's bad, but at least it's not as bad as I imagined. I close my eyes and start again, this time quickly pulling the whole thing over my head and tossing it to the floor. When I open my eyes, I see a pair of small breasts with soft pinkish nipples above all those ribs. My chest and neck are red with sunburn. My collarbone stands out sharply and glints with sweat. Soft green fabric - once Gale's shirt - is wrapped around my bony hips as a makeshift skirt. I untie it and let it fall. My underwear wore out months ago, so there's nothing underneath except a patch of black hair and a pair of skinny thighs.

Gale is watching my reflection now.

"What are you doing?" he inquires, but it's not accusatory. My naked body doesn't bother him in the least, even though I am disturbed by it, myself. In fact, I can't stand it. I look feral. And I have to do something about that.

I pause for a second, then undo my braid and shake out my hair over my shoulders, combing out the matted parts as best I can with my fingers. I walk back towards the trunk and pull out the old wedding dress, fumbling through the crinkled fabric in order to find the zipper. After realizing that it's all buttons and I don't have the patience for such a task, I give up and just slide the whole thing over my head. The skirt rustles and releases dust as it unfolds. It's far too big and slides on easily - in fact, it hangs on me like a tent. I roll the baggy lace sleeves up my skinny arms, grudgingly admitting to myself that the silky interior lining of the dress does feel soft and cool as it swishes against my legs. Then I dig to the bottom of the trunk to find something to cinch the waist with. I don't find anything suitable, but I do find a delicate string of pearls, which I hold on to for the moment.

Gale hasn't made a sound but is watching me with a half smile on his face.

"Don't say I look ridiculous," I warn, pointing at him as I cross the room to rip down the lone, shredded piece of curtain that hangs over one of the windows. I twist the fabric - which was once red but has been bleached to a pale salmon color by years of sunlight - and tie it around my waist as a sash. At last I walk back to Gale, who is still standing in front of the mirror. I thrust the string of pearls into his hand.

"Here," I say. "Put these on me."

Gale smiles at me without even looking down at the precious necklace in his hands, but obligingly clasps it around my neck when I turn and lift my hair. Finally, I spin back around and face my reflection.

My hair lies in a long, wavy tail over one of my shoulders, and the yellowing fabric of the dress comes across as a brilliant white next to my deep tan. The pearls hide the boniness of my collarbone. I adjust the makeshift sash so the messy knot I tied is hidden behind my back, and in the end I don't look half bad.

"You're beautiful," Gale says, his eyes glued to my silhouette.

"I'm human," I correct.

Understanding suddenly flashes across his features - my reflection had looked so much like a starving animal that I was desperate to do something that made me look and feel like a person again.

"Yes, you are," he confirms, wrapping his arms around me from behind and kissing the exposed side of my neck. I watch him in the mirror for a moment before I tilt my head to the side and close my eyes, relishing the feeling.

"So are you," I murmur. The only sounds are the crickets in the mid-afternoon heat and Gale's wet lips against my skin.

"Yes," he replies softly when he breaks from kissing me, sliding the gaping neckline of the dress down my small, brown shoulder.

I pull my arm out, then do the same on the other side, pushing the bodice of the dress down to the sash at my waist before spinning around to face him. I take Gale's hands and cover my breasts with them, then rise up on my toes and kiss him passionately.

There are other ways to remind ourselves that we're human, too.


	10. Chapter 10: Humanity

**Chapter 10: Humanity**

Gale and I shake the dust out of the patchwork quilt and spread it over the sagging mattress, lying down together. The room is hot, and we begin reasonably enough by undressing each other, but things escalate quickly. I end up on my back with the dress scrunched up around my waist as he stands against the edge of the bed, holding my legs apart and thrusting hard into me. He groans as he climaxes, eyes pinched shut, pressing his sweaty cheek and then hot kisses to the inside of my knee. He pulls out only momentarily, still breathless, in order to literally rip the 'sash' of the dress from my midsection and yank the whole garment down my legs and off my body. Once I'm stripped of everything except the pearls, Gale climbs back on top of me, half hard against my thigh yet again, and tongues my nipples. I half laugh, half moan in delighted shock at his continuing enthusiasm before he flips us over and guides me to straddle him.

"Yes, yes," he whispers, lifting his head up to watch as I sink down onto his length. Once he's completely inside of me, he tosses his head back into the mattress and groans. His hands guide my hips and help me set a sensual rhythm, then slide up my sides to my breasts, then back down to grip my waist. I move on top of him as he drives upwards into me, which makes the bed creak noisily. We both pause and laugh, not having encountered such a situation with our mattress of pine needles and pelts back at the cabin.

"Ignore it. Keep going," he pants, coaxing me to keep moving by squeezing my bottom. As he's doing this, I lean forward and steady my hands on his lean chest. Suddenly, a strange, deep sort of pleasure like I've never experienced before shoots right through me.

"Oh!" I cry out loudly.

"What's wrong?" Gale asks, pausing all movement.

"No, no, keep going," I beg. "It's good." I want to feel that sensation again.

Gale growls and grabs my bottom roughly, then begins to thrust into me steadily once again, harder than before. The deep, unbearably good feeling returns and I shout yet again. When Gale doesn't stop, I loose control of my muscles and sag against him, almost sobbing in pleasure.

"Yes, yes, please, more," I whimper.

"Ah, fuck," he breathes in ecstasy, still pounding into me as he grabs my hair roughly in one hand and uses the control to guide my lips to his. As he kisses me, his other arm snakes around my waist and holds me tightly, mashing my torso flat against his body. I can hear the wet slap of skin against skin over the creaking bedsprings, and I cling to his shoulders as his hips continue to drive up into me at a merciless pace. Gale crushes my cheek to his chest with one strong arm as I beg him with _more_ and _keep going_ each time he hits that newly discovered spot inside of me. His grip ensures that I couldn't move, even if I could co-ordinate my muscles to do so. But I can't. My thighs shake uncontrollably as the sensation rolls over me in waves that occur closer and closer together, until they are almost overlapping. It feels like I can't take anymore, but Gale is holding me so tightly against him that I can't get away from it.

"Gale!" I scream into his shoulder, squeezing my eyes shut as it happens. "Gale!"

"Come for me," he groans, maintaining the pace. "Oh, God, I can feel you. Yes, Katniss, fuck!"

Unintelligible sobbing, shouting, moaning noises fall out of my mouth against his hot, sweaty skin. I have no control over my muscles and my whole body spasms against his. I swear it's so intense that I black out for a second and don't even remember where I am. It's only when Gale's steady rhythm breaks for his own release that the waves of pleasure inside me let up and I'm able to open my eyes and take in a long, shuddering gasp of air. Otherwise, it might've lasted all day. Gale moans into my ear and pulls my hair as he comes, filling me for the second time. His body goes rigid for a long moment and he clasps me tightly before melting back against the bed.

"Oh, oh, oh," I moan into Gale's chest, over and over, clinging to him even though it's unbearably hot in the room. My body won't stop trembling with aftershocks. Gale releases the fistful of my hair, sighing loudly, and runs his burning hands up and down my sweaty back.

"Holy shit," he laughs, holding me a little more gently. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," I say weakly, lips moving against his skin. "Don't move yet."

The trembling doesn't stop for a good ten minutes or so, and Gale seems especially mirthful and proud of himself. He's in no rush to remove himself from beneath me. When we do sit up, I'm sore and my legs feel like jelly. My thighs are slick and wet with the product of our activities, as is Gale's stomach, and the patchwork quilt beneath us is soaked. I feel a little bad for disrespecting a place that isn't even ours by making such a mess, but I'm so in awe of the discovery we just made with our bodies that I'm not too worried about it.

"Should we just stay here tonight?" he asks when I start to fold up the blanket.

"No," I answer. "Let's take what we need and go back to our house. I don't want to sleep in ruins. It's depressing." And I'm not depressed.

Gale kisses my cheek.

"Our house," he repeats.

We both look towards the mirror but agree with one of our wordless looks that neither of us have any desire to bring it. After we silently put our clothes back on, Gale pulls the wooden door back over the cracked glass and I fold up the wedding dress and return it safely to its trunk. We gather up the quilt and the clothing and the other objects we've salvaged and exit down the rickety stairs, trekking out into the hot glare of the setting sun. Side by side, we cut a path through the tall, dry grass that hums and clicks with insects until we hit the cool, familiar shade of the woods once more. It's only once we return home after nightfall that I look down and realize I'm still wearing the pearls.

"They suit you," says Gale with a smile.


	11. Chapter 11: Swimming and Other Sports

**Chapter 11: Swimming and Other Sports**

As our second winter in the woods nears, Gale keeps teasing me, saying that I need to 'fatten up.'

"What am I, a barnyard animal?" I joke one day after he says it again. We'd spent the morning chopping wood and stacking it outside against the wall of the cabin and have now begun to replenish the indoor pile. Gale keeps telling me to knock if off and sit down for a while.

"I'm serious, I worry about you since that fever," he says. "You're not as strong as you were before."

"I'm just as strong as you are," I counter. "Maybe stronger. Definitely faster. Much better with a bow and arrow." Now I'm just being cheeky.

Gale snorts, but not maliciously.

I grab a handful of the shelled nuts that we've been collecting in a red mixing bowl and wander over to where Gale is kneeling, stacking wood neatly. I funnel some of the handful into my mouth and crunch noisily near his ear.

"There," I laugh. "Happy?"

Gale turns to me, smirks, then grabs my wrist and eats all the remaining nuts from my palm with pretend ferocity. I laugh harder as his tongue tickles my palm, and then as he wrestles me to the ground and kisses his way up my wrist and arm.

"Mmmm, delicious. Thanks for the snack," he laughs, still chewing, and kisses me on the mouth.

"Okay, okay. Let me go," I say.

"Not until you admit that I'm the strongest person in this room." He pins me down and grins.

"You're the strongest person in this room," I say, in mock seriousness.

"And the smartest."

"And the smartest!" I mimic his tone perfectly.

"And the best hunter," he continues, laughing.

"You're the best at _everything, _Gale, now get off!" I grunt, pushing against him playfully. He finally releases me and dusts off his palms.

"It's true," he gloats before returning to the woodpile. I lay on the ground for a moment, then lift myself up on my elbows and stare at him. He raises his eyebrows challengingly at me.

I've always had a competitive streak.

"I am the best at one thing, you know," I hint suggestively.

"Oh yeah, what's that?" he returns, pretending to be disinterested. But a smile tugs at the corners of his lips.

I stand up and pull off the loose shift dress I'm wearing - another farmhouse find - then drop it on the ground next to where he's crouched. Gale looks up my naked body.

"Swimming," I answer, then I turn and walk out the door.

Gale's bark of laughter follows. I don't even make it to the edge of Blue Lake before he's shed his own clothes and caught up to me.

"Did you lose your pants somewhere back there?" I tease.

"You don't ever give in, do you?" Gale says.

"Nope."

He gets an mischievous look on his face, then wraps his arms around me and throws me over his shoulder. It's not rough, like the first time he carried me, but playful. Just as I think _he's going to throw me in the water_, I'm plunged under with a loud splash. Another follows as Gale jumps in beside me. We both break the surface at the same time and laugh.

"Brr, it's getting colder out here," I say breathlessly as I paddle around to warm up.

"We probably shouldn't swim much more after today," Gale agrees, grabbing me and cornering me up against a large rock. Without asking, he slides his hand between my legs and sucks my bottom lip into his mouth. I groan softly and spread my legs to let his warm fingers enter me. We don't need to voice our need for these things anymore, they just happen naturally. He was able to read my mood from the start, and I'm ready for him.

Gale's fingers immediately find the spot inside me that makes me go weak. I hold on to his shoulder and let out a sound of relief as my hips unwittingly buck towards his hand.

"Sit up," he says, and I know it means he wants to watch. I hoist myself up onto the flat rock behind me and spread my legs so he can slide his fingers back inside me. Gale is at eye-level with his hand, watching his own movements and the reaction of my body to them. The cool air causes my nipples to pebble and goosebumps to crop up all over my skin, but I don't register any discomfort because I'm so consumed by the deep, intense pleasure that his hands are bringing to me. I grab his wrist and lean back, closing my eyes.

"Oh, Gale," I groan. His pace increases and I let go of his hand. I curl and uncurl my toes, trying to keep my legs from shaking too much.

"Open your eyes," he tells me.

He's become so adept at this that within seconds I'm trembling and crying out and dripping off his fingers and down his wrist. Gale pulls me down back into the water and claps a hand over my mouth.

"Shhhh," he says, muffling my noises but pressing little kisses against my eyes and forehead. I'm still trembling in his arms, but he keeps me afloat. I don't know if he's afraid that my moans might attract wild animals or scare them away.

"Please, please, please," I breathe over and over when he finally removes his hand from my mouth. My muscles are still clenching and unclenching, even though he's slid his fingers out. But the emptiness is only momentary - I feel him pushing his length into me and I instantly wrap my legs around him, my body still echoing with the pleasure I just received. Gale inhales sharply and steadies himself, holding me against himself as he wades towards the bank.

"Just wait a second," he laughs as I move against him, but already my body is building up again, thrusting in response to his fullness.

"You just feel so good," I whimper into his neck, clinging.

Gale lifts me out of the water and onto the grassy bank, then covers me and slides into me once again. He hooks one of my legs up over the crook of his elbow at first and sets an achingly slow pace, watching my face intently. I press my lips together in an attempt to contain my gasps and moans, but my head thrashes from side to side as waves of pleasure build up. I dig my fingertips into Gale's skin. He releases my leg and weaves both his hands into my hair, stilling me. Then he gives me a long, open-mouthed kiss. Still kissing me, his pace increases and he exhales sharply through his nose. I can tell that he's close, too, and it sends me over the edge. The damp ground beneath me seems to slant and spin. My back arches and my whole body stiffens as I climax. I hear myself crying out in hoarse, desperate whimpers, over and over again. When I finally come back to myself, Gale's palm is covering my mouth and I've been biting down onto it, unaware. He's shaking above me in the afterglow of his own orgasm, watching me with fascinated eyes.

"Katniss," he whispers.

Afterwards, we lay side by side and I kiss his palm repeatedly.

"I'm sorry," I tell him. "I didn't realize."

"It's alright," he assures me. Then he shrugs nonchalantly and smiles. "I sort of liked it."

When we sit up, our backs are covered with mud. Mine especially. We slip back into the lake and Gale helps me rinse the dirt from my hair before we draw ourselves out of the water to walk back home. As I'm wringing out my dark locks, I hear him stop behind me.

"Katniss," he says.

"What?"

He's silent for a moment. I suddenly expect the worst.

"You're bleeding."

I turn to look at him, then follow his eyes downwards to see a bit of blood running down the inside of my leg. I look back at Gale for an explanation. Had we been too rough? I wasn't in any pain.

I'm confused for a moment, then I feel incredibly stupid as I realize that his constant prodding of me to eat more must've worked. For the first time in many months, my body is healthy enough to have a period.


	12. Chapter 12: Checkmate

**Chapter 12: Checkmate**

"I don't want kids."

I had thought of a thousand kinder, gentler, more rational ways to tell Gale over the last few weeks, but instead it came out like that. He had simply asked me if I wanted the last piece of fried squirrel at supper, and I had blurted out _I don't want kids. _

I felt awful.

After staring at me in stunned silence for a moment, he jammed his fork into the cooling lump of meat in the pan.

"I'll take that as a no, then."

He has spent the remainder of the evening since scraping clumps of dried mud from his hunting boots against the woodpile outside. They should be spotless ten times over by now, and the constant _scrape, scrape_ is starting to drive me crazy. He's definitely avoiding discussing the issue.

Gale scuffs back into the cabin and removes his boots and jacket without looking at me. I notice that he's chewing on a twig, his jaw clenching and unclenching. His dark hair is damp from the rain.

He's beautiful.

We haven't made love since that day at Blue Lake, and it's starting to get to me. I used my period for an excuse when he first tried to touch me, panicked at the thought of becoming pregnant if we kept doing what we had been doing. But that story had started to falter after two weeks for obvious reasons. Every time he's tried to initiate things since, I've stopped him with vague excuses because I didn't know how to say what I really meant without hurting him. I was always met with a confused but patient response on his part - until now. Now he knows why I don't want to do it. And he's definitely hurt. Gale wants kids, and I've just shot that idea to hell with one careless statement.

He tosses another log on the fire and hangs up his shirt and pants near it, which is his standard routine before bed. I scramble under the blankets and pull back a corner for him.

"Gale?"

He extinguishes our oil lamp and climbs in next to me. I tangle my cold legs up with his warm, muscular ones.

"Hmm?"

"About earlier..." but I don't know how to finish my thought. He, however, seems to know what to say.

"Maybe one day," he muses, staring straight up.

"I- don't know. Maybe," I say quietly, feeling guilty over that note of hope in his voice.

Gale sighs.

I don't have the heart to tell him that sometimes, being out here with the looming risk of hunger and injury and illness and death, it reminds me of being in one, big, never-ending arena. Except here there are no sponsors sending parachutes, and no giant claw will come down from the sky to pick out your carcass when it's over. It's never going to be over. We're going to die out here, eventually. Probably one of us before the other. I can't bear the thought of either of us trying to survive on our own, let alone leaving a child...

"I'm not ready. I don't know if I'll ever be ready," I tell him, resting my hand on his chest. "I don't think being a mother comes naturally to me."

That, and I'm a coward.

He runs his hand through his hair and looks down at me.

"I don't believe that. I saw you with Prim," he murmurs, stroking the side of my cheek with the back of his fingers.

Yes, Prim. Who I abandoned.

Gale presses a kiss to my temple and begins to work his way down, with his hands and his mouth. "You're beautiful," kiss, "and brave," another kiss, "and smart-"

"Stop!" I say, tensing up. This can't start, because I know how it will finish. "Just stop."

Gale freezes and looks hurt. "I can't touch you at all now?"

"I don't want kids, not now, not ever," I clarify, firm but completely miserable.

"Don't you love me anymore?" He's not saying it to be manipulative. He genuinely sounds worried.

"I love you more than ever!" _Which is why I can't do it_, I want to scream.

"Then let me make you feel good," he says, resuming his downward descent. He thinks he can convince me with sex, and I'm afraid he just might. I tense up when his hand comes to the junction between my legs. I squeeze my thighs together as Gale tries to push them apart. At my resistance, he meets my eye and gives me a confused, disappointed look. He tries one more time and manages to get his fingers between my legs. He starts to rub me, which would probably feel nice if I werent forcing him to be so rough by keeping my thighs locked together, but in this state all I feel is friction. When I try to squirm away, he uses the opportunity to exert his strength over me and manages to slip a finger inside my opening.

"You're wet," he breathes, rolling half on top of me. I can feel how hard he is against my hip and I haven't even touched him.

"Gale, stop it!" I hiss in a quiet, annoyed voice. I shoot him a resentful look for taking without asking. His expression of disbelief melts briefly into one of dejected anger, and he removes his hand from my body as if he's been burned. I turn my head away to the other side before he can see me tear up.

"Fine," I hear him finally say after a tense silence. Then he rolls away, turning his back to me.

* * *

Gale spends more and more time over the next few weeks preparing for the worst of the winter weather, which translates into less and less time spent acknowledging my presence. I, too, have been busy hunting, adding to our woodpile and gathering whatever the trees are still yielding in spite of the first frost. But I get the sense that Gale is throwing himself into his activities in order to avoid me more than anything else.

We put together a little makeshift chess board to play with on cold, blustery evenings, using buttons and smooth river stones as the pieces. At first the game was hilarious to us because we'd taken to calling the pieces exactly what they were and not what they represented - 'three-button pile up' instead of _queen_ and 'pancake rock' instead of _pawn_. But now, more often than not, he simply says he's too tired to play and wants to go to bed, and I'm left to either join him or quietly entertain myself by flicking the buttons around on the floor. If he's not tired, Gale has taken to pulling apart that old radio he found in the farmhouse in his spare time. He seems to have a natural talent with electronics, which actually isn't all that surprising. As for me, I clean. I sweep and re-sweep around our fireplace, and wash and re-wash our dishes. I wish I could count down the days until it will be warm enough to swim again, but we have no idea what the actual date is or when the cold will really let up. For all we know, it could be a very long winter. It's shaping up to be that way.

I miss his touch so much that it's painful, and I've resorted to taking care of myself if I return home before he does and have the cabin to myself. But it's just not the same. I can't find the same spot that Gale does with his fingers, so I get by with just touching myself on the outside. The climax is nice, but it's not half as intense. At least it's a release, though.

I know Gale does it, too, because sometimes in the night I awake to his movements. He's usually turned away from me, pumping himself quickly and trying to keep his breathing quiet, but I'm not stupid and I'd know that breathing anywhere. Sometimes, when I wake up in the morning, I catch him looking at me longingly and wonder if he's just done it. Sometimes, while we lie in bed at night, I want to stretch out my body along his back, reach around his hips and feel the heat and weight of him in my hand. I want to press my lips to his neck and make him moan, then lick his sticky release from my fingers afterwards. But if I were to do any of that, things would escalate again and I can't bear to say no to him one more time.

Today, though, Gale is home before I am. And it's an awfully good thing, because I'm injured.

"I fell," I say as I limp in, voice knotted with pain. "I slipped on the ice. Something's broken."

Gale had been laying on the bed with his arm draped across his eyes, but now jumps up to help me.

"What is it? Your ankle?"

"My heel," I wince. "And my tailbone."

Gale guides me to lie down on the bed, then grabs something from his game bag and steps outside for a moment. When he returns, he's carrying a pink bundle filled with snow. He rolls up one of our blankets to elevate my foot, then presses the freezing bundle to my heel. I sigh in relief, even though the pain is still there, because I know Gale is going to help take care of me.

"Better?"

"Getting there," I answer. "Where did you get that?" I inquire after a moment, nodding towards the pink fabric.

"Farmhouse," he says curtly, not looking at me.

"What is it?"

I've never seen the pink fabric before, and wonder why on earth he had been keeping it a secret from me. That's when I see the delicate, faded lace collar and realize that it's a tiny baby girl's dress.

"It doesn't matter," Gale says quietly.

And my heart breaks.


	13. Chapter 13: The Radio

**Chapter 13: The Radio**

Gale piles up the baby clothes he'd salvaged and tears them into strips, using them to bandage my swollen, purple foot. He's stone-faced and presses his lips together each time he rips into the fabric. My chest feels like it's being crushed with each tearing sound. I can't bear it any longer.

"Stop!" I finally wail, putting my hand out. "Stop! No more!"

"What." He gives me a blank stare.

"You know what!"

He looks down at the pile. "These are useless to us, Katniss," he says, suddenly cold.

"Gale, please," I beg. "Don't do this."

All at once, he turns on me furiously.

"Having second thoughts, now?" he snaps. "Or are you just feeling guilty? You don't want a baby - _not now, not ever. _These," he aggressively rips the fabric in his hand in half to emphasize his point, "are useless."

"So you're punishing me? Because you're angry that I won't give you what you want?" I spit.

Then he looks away from me, and says something in a low, malicious voice that chills me to the core.

"If really wanted you, Katniss, I would just _take_ you."

At that, he throws down the remnant in his hands and stomps out the door.

I exhale slowly and search the ceiling, not wanting to believe what really happened. I'm not sure if I should feel threatened or just rejected by his last statement. I cover my face with my hands and stay like that for a long time.

I don't cry.

I don't do anything.

Eventually, I hear the door squeak open. I hear Gale come in, pause, close the door gently. Then his hunter's feet make him so silent that I can't tell what he's doing until I feel something cold against my foot again. I startle and pull my hands away from my face. He's sitting near the edge of the bed, icing my heel once more as if nothing has happened.

"What are you doing?" I croak.

"Taking care of you," Gale answers quietly.

"You don't have to do that," I finally say in a small voice. I'd expected him to storm off and disappear for few days, like he did when we fought before.

But he doesn't. Gale keeps tending to me silently, leaving me deeply, profoundly confused.

* * *

The next day, I don't want to get out of bed. Which works perfectly, because my foot is so swollen that I have a good excuse not to. What little sleep I could get between waves of throbbing pain was disturbed by the same dream, playing over and over - Gale tearing my dress from me with the same sickening sound as the baby clothes ripping. _If I really wanted you, Katniss, I would just take you_. Meanwhile, he'd slept peacefully to my left, breathing evenly.

Gale gets up, dresses, fries a cut-up potato in the pan and downs a cup of water.

"I'll be back later," he says. And that's it.

I remain in a practically catatonic state all day long and barely notice the time passing. When Gale eventually returns, his cheeks are red and he looks refreshed from his outdoor activity. When he sees me still in bed, flat on my back, he narrows his eyes.

"You haven't moved all day?"

I blink. I just realized that my bladder is full, but I don't want to ask him to help me get up and go to the bathroom.

"I... forgot," I answer.

"How's your foot?"

"Hurts," I reply, only realizing it as the word escapes my lips. I hadn't given it much thought.

He scans me, but I can't tell what he's thinking. "You want some food?"

Not really, but I haven't eaten yet today.

Gale doesn't wait for my answer. He begins to cut up some turnips that are getting old and plunks them into a pot of boiling water piece by piece. "I got a buck today. A big one," he eventually says, his voice tinged with pride.

I don't know how to respond.

"That's... good."

Suddenly he slams down his knife and turns to me.

"Look. I'm sorry. I'm sorry for what I said. I didn't mean it, and I shouldn't have said it, even if I was mad."

"It's okay," I say mechanically. I should feel something right now, but the emotion is absent.

"It's not okay!" he heaves. "People fight, but then they make up and move on. They still love each other, even if they're mad. I still care about you. I made a mistake, and I'm sorry. I'm trying to make it better, here! ... Katniss, will you say something already?"

I try, I really do. I'm not trying to give him the silent treatment. But when my mouth opens, nothing comes out. I start to panic as seconds go by in silence. _Say something, _my brain screams._ Anything! _But nothing comes.

Gale eventually turns back to preparing the food, dejected. He boils the turnips and makes them into a mash, then brings a bowl over to the bed for me. We eat side by side in silence.

"I'm gonna be outside, taking care of the deer," he finally says in a quiet voice. "Call me if you need anything."

After he leaves, I fall into an exhausted sleep. When I wake up, the oil lamp is extinguished, and Gale's sitting in front of the fire completely naked, poking at his radio. His dirty clothes lie in a pile at the door rather than being hung up as they usually are. When he turns the dial of the radio, it clicks and makes a buzzing noise that startles me.

"Hah!" Gale laughs triumphantly, then adjusts the antenna.

"What's happening?" I ask, sitting up on my elbows. "What did you make it do?"

Gale is startled by my voice, but brings the contraption over to the bed to show me.

"See this," he says, pointing to a little metal knob. "This is winds it up. The battery is dead, but it doesn't matter, because this thing must've had a handle to wind it up and charge it at one point. All I had to do was reconnect the loose wires and figure that part out."

"And it works?" I ask.

"Yeah, but there are no signals out here for it to pick up on. So it's just static."

I reach out and play with the dials. It turns on with a click, then a pop comes out of the speakers and the buzz of white noise follows.

"You're smart," I say, momentarily forgetting that we're supposed to be in the middle of a fight.

Gale looks at me like he's in pain.

"I really didn't mean what I said last night. Please, believe me. I'm so sorry. I would never hurt you like that."

Maybe he was right, what he said earlier. About people being angry yet still being able to love each other. Maybe that's something I have to learn.

"We'll figure it out, won't we?" I finally ask. He seems to know what I'm referring to and smiles weakly, reaching for my hand.

I don't pull back.

After that, things aren't completely resolved. Maybe they never will be. But we have a truce, of sorts. He kisses me softly, and I kiss him back, and when I fall asleep under his arm that night there are no nightmares.

* * *

A few days later, Gale is splitting wood outside while I'm lying in front of the fire on our new deer skin rug.

I had watched him skin it. It was the first time I'd gone outside since injuring my heel. He helped me hobble over to a log to sit down, all wrapped up in the patchwork quilt, cradling a steaming mug of hot water with mint leaves in it. Gale had gutted the animal and left it face down in the snow to bleed out, then had strung it up from the thick branch of a nearby tree the night before. The buck was easily the biggest thing either of us had ever taken down and could probably feed us for a month or more, especially since the icy winter weather made it possible to preserve such a huge kill for future meals.

I'd watched as Gale had taken a small knife and made slices in the deer's skin around its neck and hooves, then cut the hide back as if undressing the meat from some kind of fancy fur tuxedo. After he'd rinsed and dried it, we'd stretched it out on the ground in front of the fire to make a sort of carpet. When lying in bed with a bandaged foot made me restless, I would transfer myself over to the deer skin and sprawl out, face-down in front of the crackling fire, brushing its soft tuft of tail fur back and forth against my chin again and again.

I have my cheek mashed into the deer's fur right now, with my hair spread out all around me. I'm absentmindedly turning the newly functional radio on and off to pass the time. Click, pop, buzz. Click, pop, buzz. The sound is mesmerizing. I inhale the woodsy, wild scent of the animal skin beneath me and stare off into space. Wind whistles through the cracks in the cabin walls. Click, pop, buzz. Click, pop-

Suddenly, I think I hear a snippet of a conversation. Then the crackle of white noise takes over.

I rise up on my hands and knees. Did I just imagine that?

I stare at the radio suspiciously for a moment, as if it's haunted, then snap it off. My fingers then turn the dial again, in what seems like slow motion. Click. Pop-

".._.listening to Rebel Radio, a voice for the people of Pan_..."

The words fade into static.

Holy shit.

"Gale!" I yell. I only hope he can hear me outside over all that wind. "Gale, it's working! The radio's working! Get in here!"

I turn up the volume dial but the static only gets stronger, so I turn it back down. At least at a low level I can catch every other word.

"._.. Broadcast... Troops against President.._."

Troops?

"... _Rebel army, based out of District.._."

District what? What am I listening to? My mind begins to race.

"GALE!" I scream violently.

"... _Mellark, victor of the seventy...Games.._."

My heart lurches in my chest. I couldn't have just heard what I just think I did.

_Mellark._

The name resonates in my head. _Mellark, Mellark, Mellark._

White noise takes over for what seems like a long time and plays tricks on my ears. I briefly think I hear classical music. Finally, I snap out of it and jiggle the radio frantically, willing it to work again. The static dies away as it catches the faint signal once more.

"._.. Rebel Alliance... united against Snow... regime... towards a free nation and a.._. "

I audibly choke. I suddenly recognize the voice filling the room. I would know that voice anywhere.


	14. Chapter 14: Hands

**Chapter 14: Hands**

It's_ Peeta._

Peeta's voice is ringing out through the cabin that has only ever known the sounds of Gale and myself. Our laughter, our arguing, our gasping breaths as we've made love.

It's surreal.

Whether Peeta had been able to survive his worst nightmares or escape the wrath I'd provoked from President Snow before my 'death' has been a question buried in the depths of my being since the day Gale and I ran away. I've been so scared of knowing the answer that I haven't even fully acknowledged it in the privacy of my own mind until now. Relief and nausea unexpectedly and simultaneously hit me.

_Peeta is alive._

I can't focus on piecing together the meaning of what he's saying through all the static. All I can process is that it's_ his_ voice.

Gale suddenly pushes the door open and I jump, scrambling to click the radio off and knocking it over in the process. My hands are shaking.

"Glad we have that deer meat. I think there's going to be a bad storm tonight," he says. He kicks the snow from his boots against the door frame, then sees me and mirrors my stunned expression.

"What's wrong? Is your foot hurting again?"

When I fail to answer, I hear him drop Cinna's gloves and come to my side.

"... Katniss?"

I should tell him about the radio, I should, but I can't. I can't. I stare at my hands, which are gripping the animal skin rug as if hanging on for dear life. I can't explain exactly why, but I'm suddenly, overwhelmingly terrified. When I look up, Gale's face initially shows confusion, but quickly falls serious with concern. He kneels and touches my arm gently.

"Catnip, what's wrong? You're okay..."

A dry sob wrenches itself from my throat, but there are no tears that follow.

"You're shaking," Gale notices with a sad voice, drawing me close. I turn and grip the front of his shirt, burying my face into his chest and breathing in all that familiarity and safety and borrowed strength that is _Gale_. I want to pull away the layers of fabric and be as close to him as possible. I want to be against his skin, be under his skin, be a part of him. I wish we were one, inseparable being.

It startles me to realize that that's exactly what our child would be - us, put together in one body.

Suddenly, it makes no sense to me as to why I ever _didn't_ want that. I can't understand my own reasoning anymore. My fear is far outweighed by this compelling, desperate need and an even greater fear of _not_ having Gale's child. Something inside me mourns painfully for time I wasted pushing him away.

"What happened?" Gale inquires, stroking my hair softly. "Are you sick? You look so scared."

With trembling fingers, I frantically begin to undo the buttons of his shirt.

"What are you doing?" he asks in confusion, breaking the contact between us and stilling my hands in his. I look up into his face.

"Don't leave me, don't ever leave me," I choke. I can't find the words to explain how I'm feeling, so actions will have to suffice. Pulling his shirt open, I slip my hands around his ribs, flatten them against his muscular back and press my cheek to his chest. He's warm and solid and I can hear his heart beating. He's here. He's alive.

_Peeta is alive, too._

"I'm not going anywhere, Catnip," Gale says after a bewildered pause, returning to stroking my hair. "I'm gonna stay right here and cause all kinds of trouble. With you."

"No jokes," I look up at him, desperate. "Promise me you won't go anywhere."

"I won't, I promise," he says in a softer voice, still confused but willing to comfort me.

"And we'll stay together, always?" The shaking is getting worse. Gale tightens his embrace to steady me and kisses the top of my head a few times.

"Always."

I press my cheek back up against his chest and we hold each other, kneeling in front of the fire as the wind whips through the trees outside, whistling down the chimney and causing the cabin walls to creak. It sounds and feels like the world is cracking into pieces around me, and Gale is holding me steady.

"I love you," I tell him.

It might be the first time I've really understood it.

I really am selfish.

"I love you, too."

Without breaking contact with his skin, I slowly slide my one of my hands down his back, around his hip, and down the front of his pants. His breathing pauses when my small, cool fingers wrap around his length.

"Mm... what... what are you doing?" he asks quietly. I don't answer. I just begin to stroke him as I keep my cheek pressed to his chest, not wanting to lose this feeling and hoping he won't push me away. His heartbeat steadily increases as he grows stiff against my palm.

All of a sudden, Gale grabs my shoulders and peels me away from his torso. For a second I'm worried that he's going to stop me, but he only dips his face down and leans his forehead against mine, cupping my face intimately in his hands. I rub my thumb through the liquid collecting at the tip of his hardness and begin to pump him faster.

"Ah-" Gale gasps softly, sucking in his breath and keeping our foreheads pressed together. He begins to thrust into my hand a little and pinches his eyes shut. At this, I roughly shove my other hand down his pants and cup him, tightening my grip on his length at the same time. His whole body jerks and I quiet his groan with my lips. Then Gale reaches down and puts his hands over mine, slowing my movements.

"I'm gonna come if you keep doing that," he whispers.

"I want..." I lick my lips. "That's what I want. I love you," I say again, making myself at home in the words. With that, I draw his pants and shorts down together. His erection springs outward and I encircle him with both hands. Gale grunts and twitches and steadies himself by wrapping his own hands around the back of my neck. His thumbs move in small circles in the sensitive, soft places just below my earlobes as he breathes hard through his nose. A minute later he releases a sound from the back of his throat and shudders.

"Now," he says tightly, "now," just before his milky, hot liquid spurts through my fingers. I continue my movements until he doubles over and locks my wrists inside one of his fists, stilling me.

Gale's mouth is open and he's panting with his release, still holding on to the back of my neck with his other hand. Hungrily, I bring my fingers to my mouth and suck them clean. It's bitter, but it's Gale's and I want every drop. He groans as he sees me do this, sinking down onto the rug.

My hands have been unclean in so many ways. At least this time, they're sticky with him.

He pulls me close for a kiss.

"What has gotten into you," he murmurs against my lips. But if I couldn't tell him about the radio before, I really can't now.

It'll have to wait for another time.


	15. Chapter 15: Paradise Lost

**Chapter 15: Paradise Lost**

Hearing Peeta's voice for the first time in a year brings back a sense of immediacy that I haven't felt in months. It also brings back a sudden wave of the guilt and depression I'd been bogged down with when Gale and I had first fled into the woods. That night, though Gale drifts off to sleep easily, I lie awake trying to figure out how to tell him about the radio.

I mean, what do I say? _Oh hey Gale, right before you came in last night the radio started working and I heard something about a rebellion and, by the way, it was Peeta's voice_? I'm worried that if he hears Peeta too, we will slip back into old patterns in our relationship. Jealous patterns.

I graze my fingers over my eye, remembering how it had been hard and swollen shut.

Gale rolls over in his sleep and wraps his arm around my shoulder, nudging his face into my hair. His warm breath tickles my neck. I turn towards him and trace his features with one fingertip; his eyebrows, the bridge of his nose, his lips. I have his face memorized now, but sometimes I can hardly even remember Peeta's.

That overwhelming, aching sadness I experienced earlier presses down on me again and thoughts begin to rush through my mind. I lean in and kiss Gale's soft, sleeping mouth to quell the panic and fear.

Am I using kisses to escape? To forget? When I just figured out what _I love you_ really means?

What is wrong with me.

Gale mumbles something unintelligible in his sleep. I weave my fingers into his hair, squeezing my eyes shut, and bury my head safely under his chin.

* * *

In the morning, I wake up to a dreamy, swimmy sort of feeling. The spot between my legs is tingling. I register that my hips are steadily pulsing upwards before I really know why. When I do awaken fully, I find Gale scrunched down low on the bed with his head tucked between my legs. He's giving me what seem like long, slow, open-mouthed kisses, but below.

I moan softly. He's caught me in that just-awakening state where I'm too relaxed to think.

"Good morning," Gale says softly, his chin and lips shining.

"Mmm, hi," I groan, rubbing sleep from my eyes with the back of my hand as he drags himself up above me, pressing a soft kiss to my lips. I can taste myself on his mouth.

Gale knees my legs further apart and grips the hem of my loose shirt, breaking our kiss to lift it up over my head. I raise my arms to allow him but instead find that he's used it to pin my arms above, captive in the twisted fabric. He grins.

"What are you doing?" I ask, breathless but excited. He presses the length of our naked bodies together and kisses me again, humming into my mouth.

"Waking you up," Gale whispers mischievously, "as payback for yesterday."

We hadn't slept together after I'd used my hands on him, but I'd definitely made it clear that the physical barrier between us had been broken. Now I wriggle my hips beneath him and he moans in appreciation, and in the next moment he's sinking into me. I groan at the stretching fullness that I've missed so much. It's been months since I've felt him like this. It reminds me of our first time all over again.

The weight of Gale's body holds me down, his legs keeping mine spread. With my arms caught up above my head in my tangled shirt, I can't move at all. The only thing I can feel is him, driving into me over and over. I whimper and turn my head to the side as his lips connect with my neck.

"Ah, Katniss, you feel so good," Gale exhales, nipping my earlobe with his teeth. This little bit of animalistic roughness - the teeth, the restrained arms - sends a shiver of pleasure through me, though I don't know why it should.

"Harder," I moan, closing my eyes. "More, just like that."

Gale isn't taken aback by what I'm craving; after all, he knows me. Still using one of his arms to pin mine above my head, his other hand tugs on one of my sensitive nipples. I cry out and briefly regret wanting him to be rougher, but then his warm, wet mouth is on my breast, soothing the pain away.

"Ah," I breathe, grinding my hips up against his. Gale's responding moan vibrates through my chest, my nipple still in his mouth. He releases it with a wet pop, then suddenly stops.

"I want to try something," he says with an edge to his voice. I lift my eyebrows. Without any further hesitation, he flips me over and wraps an arm around my waist, pulling my hips upward until I'm bent over on my knees. When I feel him enter me from behind, it's like every sensation I was feeling before has doubled and shoots even deeper into my body, slicing through my very core. His fingers find that aching, swollen spot near my opening and begin to rub small, tight circles. I scream again, this time muffled into the mattress.

That first inward slide alone nearly brought me to climax; the wetness that had pooled inside of me is suddenly rolling down my thighs. Within seconds I'm quivering and losing control as Gale slams into me from behind. I bite the blanket and squeeze my eyes shut as I approach my peak, crying out and begging him with wordless sounds to stop and never stop, all at the same time.

"I'm coming," I ultimately manage to whimper. "Gale, I'm coming- I'm coming- Gale!"

"Oh, fuck," Gale groans above me. Then, grasping my hips and stilling himself, he pulls out and comes against my inner thigh.

My muscles are still rhythmically squeezing and relaxing when we collapse together, side by side.

"You didn't... why not?" I pant.

"I know you're not ready yet," Gale breathes simply. "It's okay. I just needed to know that you- that you wanted that for us down the road, too. One day."

I stare into Gale's grey eyes and then kiss him for a long time, until my heart starts beating normally once again.

* * *

"Let's go to Blue Lake today," I suggest later. Neither of us have to point out that it's frozen - we both dislike wasting our breath on stating the obvious.

"What do you want to do there?" Gale asks.

"... Ice skate?"

We end up sledding. Sort of. Once, when I was small, my father had taken Prim and I sledding, even though there were no really big, clear hills to coast down in District Twelve (not counting the slag heap, I suppose - but you couldn't use that). We had squealed as he pulled us along through the snow on our makeshift sled - a rope attached to a long cardboard box. I had cradled Prim between my knees in front of me, telling her to hold on tight whenever we came to a dip or incline, and then my father would let us coast freely. I'd hold onto the rope handle like the reins of a horse and we'd both shriek with delight.

Prim had lost one of her little brown mittens that day in all the excitement, and we'd searched for it from the moment our sled dissolved into soggy paper until the sun went down.

Gale and I have no cardboard, so we try various items; a blanket (which only sinks into the snow and ends up wet); the metal wash tub (which slides about an inch, then topples over, throwing Gale facedown into the snow in such a comical way that I'm in hysterics); a big piece of tree bark (which is too rough to slide at all). Finally, we discover that sitting on our tin dinner plates works if we lean back and lift our knees to our chests. Gale gets the bright idea to put two more plates under his hands and skids off the snowy bank and across the frozen surface of the lake so quickly that I'm worried he's going to crack it.

"Hey, if you break the ice, see if you can find us some fish for supper!" I call out, laughing and skidding towards him.

"There're no fish in Blue Lake, Catnip," Gale hollers back, over his shoulder. "But I did find something delicious for you."

With that he whips around and throws a palmful of snow in my face.

"Not as good as my cooking, I know," he gloats.

"No, it's wonderful," I spit, wiping my mouth. "Here, I saved you some!"

Gale expertly dodges my snowball and we chase each other back to the cabin, collapsing in a wet-haired, runny-nosed heap in front of the fire.

That night we cook a deer and potato stew together and then Gale washes my hair, which is something he first did for me back when I was sick, but which he now just plain enjoys doing from time to time.

"I just want to freeze this moment and live in it forever," I say drowsily as we crawl into bed that night. It was a perfect day.

So perfect that I fall asleep easily and forget all about the radio. That is, until I wake up to find Gale turning it on.

"Don't!" I scream, bolting upright in bed just as his fingers land on the knob.

He startles at my outburst, but it's too late. The room fills with the sound of static, punctuated by broken information about a rebellion. And Peeta's voice.

Gale stares at the radio for what seems like forever as the broadcast repeats itself. It dawns on me now that it's pre-recorded. I wait tensely for his reaction, but he remains silent and frozen in place until the third time the message begins its loop. That's when he finally looks up and meets my eye.

"You knew."


	16. Chapter 16: Secrets

**Chapter 16: Secrets**

Gale hangs his head in his hands for a long while.

I know he's wondering if Rory has joined the Rebel forces, or if his family is starving or sick or injured. I know he's wondering what exactly is happening back at home, and if it's a full-scale war, and what he could be doing for the rebellion if he were still there and not here. With me. The useless person he sacrificed it all for.

A sorry excuse for a friend, I am.

The first thing he does is kick the radio into the wall. All his talent and hard work smashes to pieces.

* * *

"What are you doing?" I ask apprehensively, standing in the corner. I hadn't dared speak until now.

After completely upturning the contents of the cabin in frustration while seemingly ignoring my presence, Gale has begun to throw things out the door.

"We never used to have secrets," is all he says as he tosses out my few bits of clothing, my bag, my bow, and whatever other items apparently belong to me. His voice is eerily calm and void of emotion - it's his actions that betray his pain and anger.

He pauses briefly and actually looks at me, and I think he's about to say more. Instead, his eyes travel to the patchwork quilt that I'm clutching and he yanks it from my hands. He considers it for a moment, then it, too, is hurled out into the snow.

"It wasn't meant to be a secret," I say in a low voice. "You're right, we don't have secrets. I just didn't know how to tell you. Yet."

"I don't suppose your _fiancé_ had anything to do with that."

"Don't say that word," I snap, tears springing to my eyes. Gale knows it's not like that.

"Were you thinking of him?" he asks angrily, turning on me. "When you touched me, when you said you loved me, were you thinking of _him_?"

"No!"

"So hearing him, that had nothing to do with your sudden change of heart?"

"No!" I lie. Poorly. It's far more complicated than even I understand, how hearing Peeta suddenly made me appreciate Gale all the more. "I mean- yes. But not in the way you're thinking."

"Get out," he says, hatred finally spilling over into his voice. "_Get out!_"

I'm silent in disbelief for a moment. He can't possibly be serious. It's the middle of winter. Trying to survive out there without shelter would be a death sentence.

"No," I say once again, but this time it's quiet and resolute. I'm a strong-willed person, usually, but when Gale's temper flares he runs right over me. Now that I think about it, that's probably my fault, for putting up with his rants about the Capitol for so many years.

He boils over at my stubbornness.

"This is _my_ house, _I_ built it!" he rages. "Why am _I_ always the one who has to leave? _You_ can find some _other_ place to live!"

He grabs my shoulders and turns me, shoving me towards the door. I resist and push back on my heels with a grunt, but his sheer size against me makes it a useless struggle.

"Gale! Ga- uff! I- stop it!" I cry, twisting free from his grip. He snatches at me by the side of my sleep shirt instead, bunching it up tight around my waist and jerking it towards himself to regain control. I'm wearing nothing below. He could drag me out into the snow half naked like this if he really wanted to. I pull away and he grunts, and then I feel the fabric rip.

Without thinking, I wheel around and slap Gale. Hard. I regret it even as I see my hand making contact with his face.

"Gale," I say in a small voice, in shock with myself more than anything.

I had been so worried about the jealousy which that radio broadcast could evoke in _him_ that I hadn't even been thinking about what a mutt it could turn _me _into.

I don't even see his expression before his hand wraps around my hair and wrenches my neck to the side. I grab at his wrist and try to pry his fingers loose, crying out, but its no use. Gale continues pulling until I fall sideways and my hip slams into the floor. I jam my fingernails hard into his forearm in retaliation, tearing open his skin, and he releases me with a hiss. He tries to shake off my grip, but it only thrashes me violently. I dig my nails in harder just to hold on which causes him to yelp in pain. He resorts to grabbing me around the neck with his free hand and squeezing until I finally give up the struggle and let go.

Just before my vision goes black, I see Gale standing over me, peering down as he clutches his bloody arm. He looks frightened. All I can hear is the ringing in my ears, but I see his mouth form one word:

_Catnip?_


	17. Chapter 17: Lists

**Chapter 17: Lists**

My neck is swollen and bruised, so I can barely move, eat or talk. It feels like I'm breathing through straws and crying threatens to suffocate me altogether. In other words, I have a lot of downtime to process what we'd managed to find out from the radio. I go over the list in my head again and again.

One: There is a rebellion going on.

Two: We don't know what district it's based out of, but there are organized rebel groups that are in contact with each other.

Three: The state of District Twelve is unknown. There was mention of firebombing in no fewer than five other districts.

Four: We don't know if our loved ones have survived.

Five: Peeta is some kind of spokesperson, although it's impossible to tell who or what for, exactly.

And, six: His message plays on a pre-recorded loop, which means he could be dead by now, too. Or captured as a prisoner of war. Really, they all could be dead - Prim, Haymitch, my Mother, Gale's siblings... the list goes on. But that's a possibility so horrifying that I don't even want to consider it.

Being left alone with my brain is a dangerous thing. I keep myself sane amidst all the uncertainty by making a counter-list of the things that I _am_ sure of.

_My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am seventeen years old. Eighteen in the spring, but I feel as old as dirt. I won the Hunger Games with Peeta. I ran away from my district with Gale. My home is here in this cabin. I should be dead. But I'm not dead._

Gale kneels beside me and presses a bundle of snow to the bruises on my neck. I shiver and sigh, but it comes out sounding like a rubber balloon squeaking as it releases air.

There were a lot of balloons during the Victory Tour. In every district, balloons and flowers for Peeta and I.

_Peeta._

"Don't try to talk," Gale chastises, taking me out of my memories and putting me back in the present. He looks like he's the one in pain, and I resent that a little.

I wasn't trying to talk.

I wouldn't want to talk to him, even if I could.

* * *

After our fight, I found I'd done Gale more damage than I had originally thought. I'm sure he feels the same way about me, because he's had a hard time looking at my neck ever since.

I'd regained consciousness to two things: Firstly, an otherworldly headache, and secondly, Gale worked up into a nearly hysterical state, like I'd never seen before. He kept apologizing over and over, his hands repeatedly brushing across my forehead and down my arms, as if he had broken me and was checking to see if I was still intact. I didn't realize at the time how injured I was; I was still lightheaded and hadn't tried to move yet. But during our fight he had wrapped one big hand around my neck and choked me until I went limp and lost consciousness, so it must've been vicious.

The thing I recall most vividly was the blood dripping from Gale's untended arm, sprinkling my torn shirt with crimson spots. The gouges and scratches scabbed over quickly thereafter but have seemed inflamed lately. They're probably infected. I haven't seen him carry out the most simple of actions, like pouring water or taking off his shirt, without wincing in pain. If I wasn't in such poor shape, myself, I could probably put together the right herbs to heal him.

We pass our time in silence, though I can tell Gale is itching for the snow to melt so he can get out and hunt. He's stir-crazy and it's driving me just plain crazy being stuck with him. I want nothing more than to be alone and curl up in some dark, warm corner - a closet or some place where sounds are muffled. I have a constant headache and the act of curling up just sounds luxurious. Instead, I must lie still on my back in a one-room cabin with Gale and all his fidgeting and noises.

He spends most of the day trying to put that damn radio back together. I loathe the thing and privately nickname it _Buttercup II_.

Gale feeds me soup and lifts my head so I can drink, but I shove away his help when I need to go to the bathroom and flatly refuse to bathe or be bathed at all. I probably smell bad, but I hardly care. Lifting my own head has become such a painful ordeal that I even begin to restrict my mushy food and water intake so I don't have to go to the bathroom as often. I learn what a bad idea that is the hard way, because eventually I pass out from dehydration while trying to urinate and have to crawl back to the cabin once I come to. After that, I gulp down all the water Gale brings, even though it hurts.

The worst part is when I choke as he feeds me, because then he tears up.

I can't stand the guilt of what I did to him and what I keep doing to him as he tries to deal with me. He feels terrible for hurting me, but it's my fault. I provoked the whole thing. And I can't stand wondering if our families are alive or dead, or if our 'deaths' could've changed that one way or the other. I can't bear the guilt, the depression, the irritation, the physical or emotional stress. That's why, when I finally regain some strength, I tell Gale in a hoarse, cracking voice that he was right - I should leave.

He only nods, subdued.

We mutually decide that I will move out when winter begins to thaw into spring. Where to, exactly, I'm not sure of just yet. Until that day comes we continue to cling to each other at night, silently dreading the morning when we will have to let go.


	18. Chapter 18: Life After Death

**Chapter 18: Life After Death**

I never thought I'd die twice.

I think leaving Gale is the most painful thing I've ever experienced. It's even worse than leaving Prim and Peeta, because at least I could find some comfort in knowing that they had others with them, others who loved them and could look out for them. After I leave, Gale and I will each be alone. But I've never been one to go back on my word, and I've convinced myself that it's for the best. Living by myself in the wilderness guarantees the eventual loss of my sanity, at the least, but I've done Gale so much harm in so many ways that I owe him this. He 'died' with me when we left District Twelve because my existence there was a hazard; now I need to pay him back for that sacrifice. I have to remove myself from his life to keep him safe, just like I had to remove myself from everyone else's lives to keep them safe. I'm toxic. I'm hazardous. Only this time, it's not because of Snow or the Capitol. It's far worse.

I have no one to hate but myself.

It's a damp but warm spring morning when I bundle up my meager pile of clothing and some of the cooking utensils into the patchwork quilt, then stuff my game bag with whatever food there is to spare. I also fold up the hammock Gale and I had made together during the winter months, taking care not to tangle it. We had spent weeks braiding and twisting scraps of fabric, weaving in the strongest pieces in with strips of durable animal skins while daydreaming of the warmer weather the hammock would be used in. At the time, it was simply a project to fill the days when the snow outside was falling too heavily for us to do much else. But, in retrospect, those hours passed side by side with only the crackling of the fire as our hands worked nimbly together were some of the most comfortable, contented moments in recent memory. Working together has always come easily to Gale and I - it's living together that hasn't. So the hammock will now serve as my bed, at least until I find or build myself a permanent shelter.

I braid my hair mechanically. I slip my feet into my worn, re-soled hunting boots and throw my arms into my father's hunting jacket, which is far, far too big on my small frame at this point. I lost weight again, over the winter. My arms might be the boniest they've ever been.

When I pick up my bow, Gale is still sitting in front of an unlit heap of kindling in the fireplace, where he's been stationed all morning. He has his back to me and is twisting _Buttercup II_'s wires, turning different knobs to see which of his adjustments have worked. I scuff the toes of my boots and hope he takes notice of the noise.

"Well... I guess I'll be going," I finally say. There's a lump in my throat that stops me from actually saying _goodbye_, or any of the other words that would express just how invaluable he has been to me.

Gale's shoulders slump. There's a long silence.

"I didn't think you'd really leave," he finally says, followed by another long silence.

"We agreed," I reply in a squeaky voice. I clear my throat and try again. "We agreed that it'd be better this way."

Gale nods, still refusing to turn and face me. I'm partially glad for it because it's easier to say goodbye like this. However, he says nothing more.

He's not one to go back on his word, either.

"Gale, I..." I start, but trail off without finishing. I want to tell him that I loved him, that I still do and probably always will, but that would just be unfair. We've already spent weeks weaning each other from those words and the feelings that lie beneath them.

"'Bye, Gale," I eventually whisper, instead. Then, before I can cry, I turn and walk briskly out the door.

I only get a few feet before tears blur my vision so badly that I have to walk based on sound and feel alone - the suction of mud, the crunch and skid of pebbles, the pillowy press of the forest floor underfoot. Sobs are welling up in my throat but I'm keeping them in, holding them in my lungs as tightly as I hold the blanket and bow in my hands, although I don't know why since no one would be around to hear me cry, anyways.

When I get to the edge of Blue Lake, I lose my grip on everything - my armful of possessions as well as my emotions. I drop my things and curl up on my side in the humid shade of the trees, crying bitterly. A small part of me had hoped that Gale would stop me from leaving before I could set foot out the door, even though I know, technically, that this is better. Still, that tiny hope has been dashed, and it leaves a searing pain in its wake.

The tears seem to come for a long time and I scrub each one from my cheeks with my dirty sleeves.

After I cry myself out and can almost think clearly, I climb the nooks and knots of a huge, old tree and string my hammock up between two of its thick branches, a good fifteen to twenty feet above the ground. I loop the strap of my food-stuffed game bag over another. Good. It'll be safe from wild animals. Then I climb carefully into the hammock and weigh the rest of my survival options. I'll need wood for a fire, and I'll probably need to shoot a squirrel or something small to eat, but not much else since I have nowhere to keep extra game. I'm right next to the drinkable water of the lake and it makes no sense to move to any other spot just yet, since I have no idea where I'm headed anyways. I decide to camp out in the tree for the night. Maybe in the morning I'll set out for the old farmhouse. It's the only other place I really know of, and it has a freshwater stream nearby.

However, by dusk I've given up on all these ideas and I'm reduced to tears once more, because I've come to the realization that no matter how much I manage to survive out here, in the end I'll never really be _alive._

There's a difference between just surviving and actually living. Gale and I had had to learn it after we first escaped into the woods. Slowly, we had figured out that life couldn't be reduced to merely having food and water and a cabin - it's made up of swimming and chess games and snowball fights and making love and quiet moments spent weaving a hammock together in front of the fire. Together, we had managed to create life after so much death had dogged us. The reapings. The mines. The constant threat of starvation. Our life in the forest wasn't perfect, but we had been there to resuscitate each other, to bring each other back.

With Gale, I'd found life even after death. Now, I will never be alive again.

From my gently rocking hammock, I hear the song of a mockingjay somewhere above. It calls out the same, lonely four notes, over and over again. It sounds like it's looking for something or someone it has lost. It reminds me of Rue. Sorrow and guilt hit me and crush my already aching chest.

I crane my neck to find the bird, but I can't see anything from inside the tree's thick, green canopy except the shadows of the cliffs that surround Blue Lake.

I've already died once. Staring at those cliffs, I realize what my only other option is.

With cold fingers, I climb down from my perch. I make a path around the far edge the water, hiking the incline and ultimately emerging from the brush to find myself on top of the cliffs and nearer to the edge of the sheer rock face than I had expected.

I've never been up this high before, and the treetops span as far as I can see against a backdrop of sunset-streaked sky. It's breathtaking. Looking down, Blue Lake looks deeper and rockier than it seems from its shores. Its cliffs are jagged and appear almost purple in the dusky light. The wind whips through my hair and I shiver, wrapping my arms around my chest. I'd left my jacket in the tree. Soon, it'll be dark.

That's when I hear it. A soft sound behind me from someone who has been watching over me all day, making sure I was safe, though I hadn't known it.

"Catnip," Gale says. He's crying. "Don't jump."


	19. Chapter 19: Home

**Chapter 19: Home**

Gale takes a tentative step towards me.

"Please?" he says. A gentle plea. Another small step forward.

My eyes are glued to the red-eyed, utterly broken expression on his face.

With every movement that brings him closer, something inside me winds tighter, gets closer to snapping. I press my lips together to keep any sound from escaping, though I know what's coming. Gale reaches forward and wraps his arms around me, tight.

I feel my face crumple as I burst into tears.

"Come home to me," he says, soothing me as I cry, pressing his own tear-stained cheek to the top of my head. "Come home."

* * *

That night, Gale and I watch the sunset from the top of the cliffs. The sky turns brilliant shades of red and pink, then fades to purple as the sun dips below the horizon. I stay curled up on his lap like a child the whole time, sniffling, but he never once lets me out of his embrace. Afterwards, we pick our way down the slope, hand in hand. By the time we get to the edge of Blue Lake, it's almost completely dark out. I'm cold and exhausted, both emotionally and physically. Gale easily lifts me in his arms, carrying me the rest of the way back to the cabin. I breathe in his familiar scent and hear nothing but his soft, even tread below and the hum of crickets in the grasses around us. It feels like a dream.

When he nudges open the door with his foot and brings us both inside, the embers of the fire are throwing off a cozy, welcoming glow. It smells like home. He lowers me to the bed - _our _bed - and then unties each of my boots delicately, sliding them from my feet one at a time.

Everything seems to move in slow motion, as if we are underwater. Gale lies beside me and gently unbuttons my shirt with one hand, attending to each tiny closure then running his finger up the exposed strip of skin that's left, from my bellybutton to my collarbone. He peels the cloth away from my body and his warm hands softly caress my breasts, molding them to his palms, tracing their shape with the lightest of touches. He slides my pants down my legs, moving down to untangle each foot before gliding his hands back up over my thighs and the slight curve of my hips. Then he nestles himself against my side once again and rests his head on my chest, watching his fingertips trace patterns over my body, as if memorizing each part. Every touch sends a ripple through me.

When we sit up, I see myself reach for his soft, worn-out shirt and lift it over his head, discarding it lightly beside us. We both watch as my fingers trail down his chest and abdomen to the waist of his pants. At the same moment that I undo the button, Gale reaches forward and wraps the end of my braid around his fingers. Then he leans in and kisses me, long and slow and soft. He uses his hands to comb my hair loose while our lips and tongues move together, then rests one palm on my cheek. I drape my arms over his warm shoulders. Still without breaking our kiss, we sink back onto the bed, and he covers me with his body.

Everything after that carries the essence of being liquid and warm. His tongue, his fingers, his body filling mine. We pant and gasp into each other's mouths as our pleasure builds in waves, breathing in tandem as one being. Gale's movement inside of me is deep and rhythmic and hypnotic, only interrupted by the hard thrust that accompanies his climax. I continually press my hips up and up and up and cry out a little as I approach mine, but he captures the noise between his lips and kisses it quiet. He never once takes his hands off of me - we cling to one another.

Afterwards, I keep feeling the echo of Gale's slick body moving above and within me, even as I drift into a deep, relaxed sleep with my cheek pressed against his chest.

This is home.

* * *

It's well into the hottest months of the year when Gale surprises me by filling the hammock with wildflowers.

After we made up, we had retrieved the hammock from the old tree and re-strung it in a low, shady place near Blue Lake. It quickly became my habit to swim early in the mornings and then lie in the hammock afterwards to dry off. That's where Gale intercepts me today.

"Happy un-birthday," he grins as I approach, wringing out my hair. "We never celebrated your birthday so I thought we should."

"You don't even know what month it is right now," I laugh. "It's too hot for May."

"Exactly. _Un_-birthday," he emphasizes. He's leaning against the trunk of the tree and chewing on mint leaves, looking casual. As if he does this every day.

"Ah, then that explains it," I joke, but the truth is, I'm touched by his thoughtfulness. As I draw near, I see that every space in the weaving of the hammock has been filled with a freshly plucked flower, and in the middle lies a thick, yellow bundle. Sunflowers. It must've taken him days to collect all these and keep them hidden from me.

"Gale, it's beautiful," I say, suddenly shy. I've never been good at accepting gifts, but Gale knows that and doesn't make a big deal out of it. He just smiles and wraps his arms around my wet body, kissing my shoulder.

"I also got us some corn," he adds.

"My favorite."

We agree to have an un-birthday meal when I get back from hunting that afternoon. After throwing my loose shift dress over my head, cinching it at the waist and then shoving my feet into what will soon become some very hot, sweaty hunting boots, I braid back my wet hair and set out. I grab my bow and quiver of arrows along the way, all the while munching on a handful of nuts and blackberries. It feels good to be out and hunting again; I feel like myself.

Over the last few months, Gale and I had encountered an unusual string of illnesses and injuries. First, I had fallen from the hammock and broken my wrist. It was only a short fall of a few feet given the hammock's new, lower location, but I had landed the wrong way and the damage was done. Then Gale had badly burned his hand over the fire. That first night we'd both barely slept - him, because of the pain, and me, because every hour I was having to bring in fresh, ice-cold water from the lake so he could keep his hand submerged. Luckily, we'd both encountered enough healing plants in our lives that we knew exactly how to treat a burn, and he recovered quickly thereafter. Then I'd come down with the same mysterious illness as I'd had last year, only this time it didn't last as long and I vomited more. So to be back out in the woods, on my feet and breathing in the fresh air, it makes me feel like a whole new person.

I'm just taking aim at a squirrel after an earlier, unsuccessful encounter with a nest of birds when my stomach cramps. Ugh. Either I'm sick again or I'm getting my period, neither of which are exactly convenient. Still, I manage to stay steady and shoot the thing right through the eye.

"Gotcha," I smile. As soon as the words leave my lips, another cramp hits me. This time it's painful enough that I double over. When I look down, I see blood running down my legs. Great. I guess I'll be returning home with just one squirrel.

Only, I never make it home. I make it about as a far as where the dead squirrel fell before the cramps are so painful and so constant that I have to sit down. I lean against the trunk of a tree and close my eyes, focusing on my breathing instead of the pain and waiting for it to pass. When I look down again, the amount of blood coming out of me is pretty scary, and it contains huge, dark clots.

I'm feeling lightheaded. My periods are never like this. Something is wrong.

"Gale!" I holler, although I'm pretty sure I'm far enough away that he wouldn't be able to hear me anyways. I crawl a few feet but then have to lie down right there in the dirt, curling up on my side and clutching my lower stomach. The cramps start to wrack my body and let up so infrequently that I begin crying, out of fear more than anything. Blood coats my thighs and soaks into my dress. Then, with what feels like my body giving a huge push, I feel something almost fall out of me. There's no other way to describe it. When the cramps ease up somewhat afterwards, I sit up and lift my stained skirt to see what it was.

There, in the dirt and blood beneath me, is a tiny, tiny baby in a translucent sac. Not fully formed, but definitely a person, with little fingers and toes and everything. I could hold it in the palm of my hand. But I'm so shocked that I don't. I don't do anything at all.

I hadn't had my period all winter, when I was too thin to get it anyways, so I didn't think much of the fact that it hadn't returned in these last few months, either. The blood continues to flow out of me at an alarming rate, and another wave of cramping hits me. I lie back down in the dirt and finally begin to sob as the reality of the situation sinks in.

I thought leaving Gale was the most painful thing I could experience, but losing the baby I didn't even know I was carrying is far worse.

I hadn't even known how much I'd wanted it until it was already gone.


	20. Chapter 20: Deep Shadow

_Author's note: Written while listening to Deep Shadow (lyrics version) by TTL._

* * *

**Chapter 20: Deep Shadow**

I lie on the ground cramping and bleeding for what seems like an eternity, trying to drag myself home but ultimately dipping in and out of consciousness when the blood loss and exertion combine together and overwhelm my body. There's a grizzly looking trail of blood behind me from the moments when I'd tried to crawl, which makes it appear as though I've been attacked. It's late and the sun is getting low in the sky by the time I hear Gale calling my name.

I never made it home for my un-birthday dinner.

In a sudden rush of footsteps, he's at my side. He takes one, panicked look at my bloodied form and rolls me onto my back, scooping up my head and shoulders in his arms.

"What happened?" He asks. "Hey, Katniss, look at me. Up here." He pats my cheek a little. "Was it an animal? Where are you hurt?"

"A baby," I tell him weakly. He seems confused. "A baby. In the dirt."

Gale looks at me frantically, then back over his shoulder at the trail of blood behind us.

"It's dead," I say. Then my neck falls limp and everything goes black.

* * *

I have a vague sense of being carried home, but I don't regain my vision until I'm lying in bed. Gale is sponging me off with warm water, and two untouched plates of roasted corn sit by the fire.

"Are you okay?" he asks, searching my face.

The pain is there, but not as bad. I nod.

"Did you find it?" I ask weakly. The thought of my baby left out there in the woods breaks my heart, even if it is dead. It should be safe and alive, inside of me. Gale only nods. Tears begin to seep from the corners of my eyes.

"We can bury it when you're feeling better."

He reaches for my hand and we say nothing for a long time.

"I'm sorry," I eventually choke. I hate myself beyond words for ever thinking that I didn't want Gale's child.

"Shh," Gale says, but he's still looking down at our hands. "It's not your fault. You have nothing to be sorry about."

* * *

Days later, I'm still bleeding. Gale tries to get me to eat, but I only take a few feeble bites of each meal before giving up. It costs too much energy. I pass out when I get up to go to the bathroom, and eventually I can't stand up at all. Even breathing is laborious and difficult. I drift in and out of sleep. One day, it takes Gale such effort to wake me that when I finally do open my eyes, he's frozen in panic above me.

"I thought you were- I thought I'd lost you," he sputters, the color drained from his face. Then he brings me food and water robotically and says he'll be right back.

Moments later I hear his muffled sobs outside the door.

Gale tries so hard to be strong and keep himself composed. Every day he brings me a new type of flower and adds it to a jug of water beside the bed, then talks about all the things we'll do when I'm better.

"It's going to be a warm autumn again, Catnip," he says. "We'll go to that orchard and pick apples. I want to try roasting them, don't you?"

But by the time the flowers in the jug become a full bouquet, I'm even worse than before.

One night, I save up all my energy just to reach for Gale's hand and give it a light squeeze. His head snaps up expectantly, surprised by my movement. I wish I could comfort him more than this, but it's all I have left to give.

We both know that I'm dying.

* * *

The next thing I register is being carried through the woods. Gale has me cradled to his chest, wrapped up warmly in one of our blankets. My arms are bundled up, but my bare feet hang down. I make a small noise and he looks down into my face.

"We're almost there, just hang on," he says. He sounds worried, but determined.

I have no idea where 'there' is, but I trust him.

* * *

When I open my eyes once again, I'm lying in Gale's lap and we're in a concrete room. It takes me a moment to realize that we're back in the house by the lake that my father had once shown me. I turn my head infinitesimally and see a glowing fireplace with a little broom made out of sticks leaning against the wall beside it. My father made me that broom so I could play here. Yes, this is the same house. Which means we're only a couple of hours away from District Twelve.

Gale is holding me with both arms, rocking slightly and staring into the fire. His eyes are wet - evidence that he's been crying, and recently. When he looks down and realizes I'm awake, his eyes fill up once again and he doesn't hide it.

"Hey, Catnip," he murmurs. "Are you okay?" He checks to make sure my bare feet are covered with enough of the blanket, then turns back to my face. "You're… not doing so good," he says finally, his voice cracking.

_I know_, I want to say. I move my chapped lips a little so he knows that I heard, but nothing really comes out.

"You- you have to go away for a little while now," he chokes. Tears are now freely streaming down his cheeks and dripping onto the blanket that covers me. I don't know what he's talking about, but seeing Gale weep like this is breaking my heart. I try to lift my hand, and that's when I realize something is wrapped around it. I roll my eyes downward and see that it's the pearl necklace Gale had hung around my neck when we were at the old farmhouse. He's now wrapped it around my palm and closed my fingers so I'm clutching it. "But I promise you, we'll be together again," he eventually finishes, then kisses my forehead, my cheeks, my eyes, my fingers, my lips, my forehead again. "I love you."

Gale lifts me and places me down in front of the blazing fire, close enough to keep warm but far enough away that it's not too hot. He adjusts my body and makes sure that I'm comfortable. Then he rubs his palms over his eyes until they are red, kisses my lips again, long and slow, and then once more, as if he just can't help it. His tears fall onto my cheeks.

My vision is starting to fade out again, but I don't want it to. I don't want to close my eyes. I get the sense that Gale is leaving, or that I'm going somewhere, and I don't want to.

He stands up above me. I can see his chin quivering. My senses are playing tricks on me, and somewhere in the distance I think I hear static, just like the sound that came out of the radio the night Gale had made it work. I blink slowly, and two fat tears roll out from the corners of my eyes.

When I open my eyes again, Gale is standing at the door, looking back at me.

He's leaving. He's leaving me here. This is where he's leaving me to die.

"Gale," I say, or try to say. It comes out as a croak.

"Catnip," he says, breaking down completely.

And then he's gone.

The next time I regain consciousness, I'm in a room so bright that it hurts my eyes, and I'm staring up into the face of someone I never thought I'd see again.


	21. Chapter 21: Fragments

**Chapter 21: Fragments**

The first person I see is Haymitch.

If I've died, this is not heaven.

"Well, well. Back from the dead, are we, sweetheart?" he says, peering down at me. I can smell the alcohol off his breath, but I'm too weak to recoil from it. His face blurs in and out.

The room is full of bright, white lights and buzzing and beeping and there are tubes and wires snaking their way all over my body. I feel lost in a bed that seems too big and too soft. Aside from Haymitch's acrid breath, the room has an overpowering antiseptic odor that is so strong it hurts my throat. The whole place is invading my senses with its noise and stench and obnoxious, fluorescent lights, all of which I am not used to after living in the quiet depths of the forest for nearly two years. And where is Gale?

"Gale?" I try to call out, but instead I wheeze. My throat is dry. There's a tube under my nose forcing oxygen into me. I need Gale. Where am I?

My vision keeps blurring in and out and the beeping is getting louder.

"Get a doctor," barks Haymitch. I want to, but I can't seem to move. It takes a moment for me to figure out that he wasn't giving the order to me - I'm the one who needs help.

* * *

For a while, consciousness comes and goes in disjointed bits and pieces. I never quite know where I'll wake up next. At one point I find myself in a narrow tube that is scanning my body, and I scream until something cold is injected into my arm and the blackness pulls me under once again. It's safe and predictable and quiet in the dark. Almost comforting, except for the queasy feeling that accompanies it.

One day, I open my eyes and notice that some of the wires are gone, and I feel less dazed than before. But as soon as I realize that I'm still in some kind of sterile, unfamiliar hospital room, it feels like I've been punched in the stomach.

There's a doctor and nurse nearby, looking at some paperwork. They're talking about me.

"… A simple miscarriage, but in her malnourished and weakened state the hemorrhaging and subsequent uterine infection…"

_Simple_ _miscarriage_? Who is this jackass. I want to punch him. There is nothing simple about losing your baby and bleeding out in the dirt. The physical pain, the searing loss, the guilt of not being able to carry it and keep it safe. He knows nothing.

I want Gale.

At that moment I start to cry, and the doctor finally seems to realize that I'm actually in the room.

"Katniss Everdeen," he says formally. "I'm Doctor Aurelius. Do you know where you are?"

_No._

"Do you know what day of the week it is?"

_No._

"Can you tell me how many fingers you see in front of you?" He holds up four, all squished together. I blink past them and stare at his face, but nothing about its features are familiar. I just want Gale.

I halfheartedly lift four fingers in response. It takes Dr. Aurelius a moment to look down and see my gesture. He then returns to writing on his clipboard papers and I stop existing, yet again.

"She's disoriented but doesn't appear to be suffering from any head trauma. Potentially avocal, but we'll have to test... "

* * *

It's been days, but I haven't seen Gale or a single familiar face since that first encounter with Haymitch. I also still don't know where I am. The nurses regularly and predictably hook up bags of liquid that drip down a tube and through a needle embedded into the back of my hand, but they won't say anything. For food, I'm eventually given some kind of mush that Dr. Aurelius says is bland and will help my body recover from starvation, but it's overpoweringly sweet to my palate and I refuse to eat it. I hurl my pillow and my bedpan and rip the tubes out and try to run away, but my legs collapse beneath me as soon as I stand. The nurses hear my monitors beeping angrily and come to lift me back into the bed. I scream my head off for Gale the whole time, yet they still tell me nothing and finally resort to strapping me down and sedating me. When I awake, the tubes are back in, and Dr. Aurelius is hovering nearby.

"Katniss, your fiancé is here to see you."

For a brief moment, I think he means Gale and has just gotten the title wrong. Instead, Peeta emerges from behind the green curtain, approaching slowly and apprehensively.

So he is alive.

I guess in some perverse way, we _are_ still engaged and the doctor is technically correct. But the person I see in front of me is not the boy with the bread, or the broken one who I survived the arena with, but a tired looking young man in a nondescript uniform. The circles under his eyes stand out like bruises in the fluorescent light. When it becomes apparent that I'm not going to pitch a fit, the doctor looks pleased that his idea to calm me is working and finally leaves us alone.

"Press this button if anything volatile happens," he tells Peeta as he passes.

Peeta doesn't acknowledge Dr. Aurelius in any way, but keeps his eyes on me. His chair scrapes as he pulls it up near the side of my bed. Our eyes are locked on each other, each waiting for the next one's move. He's studying me like he's not sure if I really exist, like I might be a ghost if he were to reach over and touch me. I feel like I knew him in some other lifetime. Which, I guess I did. He's like a very familiar stranger.

Peeta clears his throat. "I didn't think I'd ever see you again."

"Where's Gale?" I blurt out, then feel a pang of guilt. I should probably be kinder to Peeta, since I did make him believe I was dead for the last two years. He's probably still in shock. I try to remember what it was like for me when I first heard his voice on the radio, then try again. "I… didn't think I'd see you again, either," I say softly. "Hi, Peeta."

"Hey, Katniss."

He sounds weary. I'm suddenly certain that he hates me for running away. He thinks I'm a coward. It's silent except for the machines' buzzing and beeping for a while.

"Where are we?" I finally ask.

"District Thirteen," he answers, running his hand through his messy hair. Blonde. I am a little distracted by it, since I haven't seen the color in so long. "Are you feeling better?"

"But how?" I start, ignoring his question. How did I get here, how did he get here, and how does _here_ even exist when it was supposedly bombed off the map during the Dark Days? There are just too many questions and my tongue can't form them all.

Peeta sighs.

"There's a war going on, Katniss," he says, picking the simplest terms. "District Twelve was bombed. Some of us live here now."

"I know," I say. Peeta looks surprised, but I don't bother to explain about the radio. All of a sudden, a cold jolt pierces through me. "Why hasn't my family come to see me?" I ask.

Peeta leans his forearms on his knees and looks down at his hands. I have a terrible, sinking feeling.

"District Twelve is gone," he finally explains, his eyes glassy like the surface of Blue Lake. "I'm sorry," he adds softly. "So many people didn't make it out. We tried to-"

"And Gale?" I ask, gripping the rails on either side of the bed. I'm holding the tears at bay just long enough to ask this one question. "Where's Gale?"

"Katniss," he says gently, "Gale was the one radioed us to come get you."

"Where is he?" I demand. I can't do this without him. Peeta shakes his head as I run ahead of his explanation.

"It's not that simple. When we first got his signal, we thought it that maybe it was some sort of Capitol trick. That maybe they were using your name to try to lure me out there."

I still don't know exactly what he or Haymitch are doing for the Rebel Alliance, and should probably ask. But I don't.

"You were supposedly dead, so a call like that, out of nowhere… it was unreal. But Gale came clean and told us everything about the fire and how you both escaped in order to prove it really wasn't a Capitol maneuver."

I turn my head away so he won't see my tears. This is too much. Peeta lowers his voice.

"Katniss… when your house burned down and people thought you'd been killed, there were rumors that Snow had done it on purpose. That he'd set you up with a faulty house in Victor's Village and he'd planned your death. It was part of what contributed to the uprising against the Capitol in District Twelve. Just another reason for people not to trust President Snow's government."

I knew it. I killed my family. I'm responsible for all their deaths, for the bombing of the whole district. It's my fault.

"Gale said it was all his idea, and that you didn't even know and shouldn't be held responsible. He set that fire, he kidnapped you, and he was the one who made the Capitol look bad," Peeta continues. "He knew that they'd be after him if they found out that he was still alive, after pulling off something like that."

"So you left him out there?" I say frantically, whipping my head back and startling Peeta. He sits up straight and regains his composure.

"No. He volunteered to bait them. For the cause. He agreed to send interfering radio signals to the Capitol to draw their attention away and divert them to another location if we would just send a hovercraft out there to rescue you."

"So where is he now?" I repeat, one last time.

"We don't know."

"Can't you follow the location of his radio signals, just like the Capitol can?"

"Katniss…" Peeta rubs his eyes. "There are no more signals out there. Do you understand? We're not picking up anything."

I turn my head away and begin to weep, tuning out the rest of his words. All I hear is the end of his final statement.

"... He must've loved you a lot."


	22. Chapter 22: Therapy

**Chapter 22: Therapy**

_My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am eighteen years old. My home is now District Thirteen. My mother is dead. My father is dead. My little sister, Prim, is dead. My baby is dead. Gale is nowhere to be found, and is probably dead. And it's all my fault._

* * *

A week or so later, Dr. Aurelius deems me stable enough, physically, to be released from the hospital ward. Peeta, as my fiancé, is the closest thing I have to family now. We are assigned to a compartment together, deep underground in District Thirteen's living quarters. Everything is done underground here. Dr. Aurelius explained something about residual radiation levels above the surface, but I wasn't listening.

The compartment is small, but it seems cavernous to me. The bedroom area is easily three times larger than the cabin Gale and I shared, and its attached bathroom - equipped with a shower that runs with warm water - seems like a sparkling, white-tiled palace. I wash the matted tangles out of my hair with the scented foam soap that's provided and stay under the warm spray as long as I can, which is until the shower has reached its daily water ration limit.

As for the mirror, I avoid it completely.

Peeta sleeps on the couch that first night we're in there together, and I'm mildly relieved. But the bed is so cold and wide and springs so unsettlingly every time I move that I eventually end up sleeping on the floor, curled up in the space where his arm hangs down over the cushions. After that, he lets me rest my head on his bicep during the night, just as we did in the arena and on the train. It's the closest thing I get to affection. Other than that, Peeta treats me politely, like a colleague or acquaintance, but not as an old friend. I don't exactly blame him. I'm not really sure what I was expecting, anyways.

My heart aches for Gale's embrace, but at least Peeta's makes me feel safer and affords me a few hours of sleep each night, during which I usually dream of bombs. Sometimes the dreams begin with Prim, sometimes Gale, sometimes with my baby and often - strangely enough - with my mother, but they always end with the bombs. When I awake screaming from these nightmares, Peeta wipes the tears from my cheeks and seems to understand. But I refuse to talk about any of them, and he doesn't press me to. The only time I cry is when I'm asleep. The rest of the time, I feel nothing. I am a ghost, like the rest of them.

The cafeteria in Thirteen serves exact portions to each person based on their age, build, gender and occupation, but even with my non-occupation of 'mentally disoriented' branded onto the bracelet they gave me, I never manage to finish even a small bowl of stew. I tend to vomit from a lot of the food here. Dr. Aurelius says my digestive system isn't used to consistent, balanced meals - I think it's just not used to being scientifically fed. I'm accustomed to fresh game and starchy potatoes, wild corn and juicy blackberries, tart green apples and sweet, earthy carrots. All the food here tastes overwhelmingly artificial and has the same unappetizing, slimy texture.

The one thing that I do like, though, is the bread. I haven't tasted bread in a long time, and it's comforting and stays down. Milk is also a luxury that I've gone without. It's thick and creamy and I will willingly swallow my daily handful of medications if I can take them with milk. Dr. Aurelius tells me I've been rationed more of it than the other residents of Thirteen because my bones have been leached of calcium, so, more often than not, I do get a glass.

The milk is one of the few things about my life here that I'm actually okay with.

I haven't seen real sunlight or inhaled fresh air once. I crave it desperately, but there are no windows in sight and every room is filled with the roar (at least, to my ears) of vents pumping in dry, filtered air at all hours. In response, my body seems to shut down its energy output until all I want to do is sleep. The only problem is that when I sleep I have nightmares. And when I have nightmares I can't sleep.

As a result, I spend my days wandering restlessly through corridors that all look, sound and smell the same. At one point, I find some sort of boiler room. It's exceptionally warm and houses a furnace with a flicker of fire visible in its belly. It makes me long for the warmth and smell of the fire back in the cabin so badly that I take off my clothes and lie down right beside it, just to feel the heat on my skin. A worker finds me like that and word gets around. Dr. Aurelius tells me I can't just take off my clothes whenever I feel like it here in Thirteen.

Peeta raises his eyebrows at me the first time I get into the shower with him still standing right there in the bathroom. I'm momentarily confused, then realize that all he has to go on is his memory of me as a girl who was shy of nudity. But Gale and I were naked all the time in the woods, and it never mattered there. And I can't bring myself to care, now. The old Katniss is gone.

At least Peeta doesn't say anything. He is the only one who puts up with me patiently, even though I barely acknowledge his presence. Sometimes, I just sit on the bed and stare off into space for hours at a time. I think he understands that something inside of me is broken. Haymitch, on the other hand, tries to provoke me and makes offhanded comments that would probably hurt my feelings if I still had feelings. But he gives up quickly when he realizes that I'm unresponsive.

It's everyone else who won't leave me alone.

Every few days, I'm forced into therapy with Dr. Aurelius, who prods me to talk about things I don't want to talk about.

"Have you done as I suggested and given a name to the fetus you lost?" he asks.

I zone out and stare at the fake wooden bookshelf in his office, pretending that it's the trunk of tree and that I'm out in the forest once again.

" … your mother and Primrose. There is a memorial for the victims on level 26. Have you given any thought…"

I squeeze my eyes closed. I can almost smell the pine needles.

"… an important part of the grieving process. Katniss? How are you sleeping?"

I keep my eyes closed and pretend that the creak of his chair is a bird calling, that the scribble of his pen is a squirrel scrambling around a tree trunk.

"Katniss, if you don't co-operate with me here you aren't going to get any better."

The air vent drones. It's a breeze. No. A distant waterfall.

"Let's discuss Gale."

My eyes snap open.

"Let's not," I growl. It's the first thing I've said all session. Dr. Aurelius has hit a nerve and he knows it.

"Katniss, do you resent Gale for taking you forcefully from your home?"

_I resent you for bringing it up_, I think. I glare at the doctor and he writes something down.

"Did he ever hit you?"

Yes. Is that what you want to hear? We were essentially two kids, burdened too soon with family responsibilities, and we thought that meant we knew how to live as adults. But we didn't. We had to figure it out without anyone's help and got it wrong a few times. However, I get the sense that Dr. Aurelius wouldn't really care to listen to that part.

"Did he ever force himself upon you, sexually?"

My mind wanders back to the morning when I woke up with Gale's tongue between my legs. I remember the way he gripped my thighs to hold me still and pressed his mouth and nose right against me, moaning. I remember the salty taste of his skin as I kissed my way down his firm stomach, and his hands tightening in my hair. I remember how his length felt in my mouth, hot and smooth and satisfying between my lips as I dragged the flat of my tongue along it. I remember the weight of him as he rolled on top of me, his breath against my neck as he begged me to say his name, and the warm, wet gush when he pushed in deep and came inside of me. And I remember how much I liked it.

"You never knew exactly where he took you, or how to return home from that location, is that correct? He kept it a secret from you?"

It is correct. But Dr. Aurelius wouldn't understand if I tried to tell him the presuppositions behind his questions are all wrong. He'd just prescribe me more pills.

"It's called _emotional hijacking_, Katniss. It's when a captor exploits the pre-existing relationship he has with his victim in order to gain control." He leans forward in his chair and speaks in a low voice. "Did it ever cross your mind that maybe Gale _knew_ he was inciting a rebellion by setting fire to your house?"

I shake my head minutely. No. Gale would've told me. This is preposterous.

I catch Dr. Aurelius looking at me knowingly. Suddenly, I'm enraged.

"Gale is dead," I spit hoarsely, defensively. "Are we done here?"

Silence, but for the air vent.

I don't wait for an answer before getting up and walking out.


	23. Chapter 23: Grief

**Chapter 23: Grief**

One night, I have an unexpected, different kind of nightmare.

I dream that Gale and I are laying in the hammock, rocking back and forth gently as his fingers find that spot inside of me that makes me quiver and go weak. It's so real that when I awake with a start, I still feel the gentle sway of the hammock beneath me and the throb of desire between my legs. Moving my hand down, I discover that my thighs are slick. It's the first time I've really _felt_ anything in a while. For some reason, this scares me.

Peeta is sleeping beside me, his arm around my shoulders and his lips parted just slightly, inhaling and exhaling evenly. He's the only really familiar thing to me here in District Thirteen, and the only one who seems to understand my situation.

It suddenly occurs to me that _of course_ he would understand my situation - on top of his family dying in the bombings, he mourned Katniss Everdeen two years prior. He's lived through exactly the same thing that I'm going through with Gale and my own family, but on account of me. I feel a stab of guilt.

"Peeta?" I whisper. He's completely out. I curl up tighter against him, facing him.

I trace the outline of his eyebrows, the bridge of his nose, his lips, just like I had done to Gale; Gale, whose skin was more familiar to me than even my own. The hammock dream begins to replay in my mind, but I shove it away before I can cry. Instead, I focus on mapping out Peeta's sleeping body beside me. I slide my hand down his chest and across his abdomen. It rises and falls with each breath he takes. His skin is warm.

_Peeta is alive._

He could tell me about my mother and Prim in the years between the games and the bombings. He's my last link to them.

One day. I'll ask him one day. When I am brave enough.

"Peeta?" I whisper again, starting to feel a little desperate not to be left alone with my own thoughts. Sorrow is beginning to seep into them and I'm not prepared to handle it alone.

"Mmm," he responds, half asleep. Mostly asleep.

I wrap one of my legs around his good leg and run my big toe along the hair on his ankle. I need to feel something other than sadness. Anything. Now.

"Peeta, wake up," I say quietly, sliding my hand down over the front of his shorts. He's half-hard. Warmth radiates through the fabric. He twitches against my hand, so I begin to rub him.

Peeta shifts, eyes still closed, and a small moan rattles in his throat. I take one of his hands and slide it up under my nightshirt so that his palm rests limply against my bare breast. At first he does nothing and I think he's fast asleep again. Then he moans and shifts once more, squeezing my breast. I lean in and kiss his soft, slack mouth. A minute later, I feel the gentle pressure of him kissing me back.

Then his eyes blink open. He jerks back from my lips and looks confused, then reaches down and takes hold of my wrist, prying my fingers away from his growing erection.

"Katniss?" he asks, more uncertain of what's going on by the second. He rolls onto his back but is briefly impeded by his forearm tangled inside my shirt.

I simply lie there. I should probably explain myself, or at least feel bad. But I feel nothing at all.

Peeta stares straight up at the ceiling and runs both of his hands through his hair, then exhales loudly.

"What was that about?" he finally asks, turning to look at me. He doesn't seem disgusted or upset, just concerned.

But I don't know what it was about. Coping with the insomnia and the grief and the constant nightmares, I don't think I really know anything, anymore. The medications Dr. Aurelius prescribes don't make my thought processes any clearer, and my so-called therapy sessions only plant seeds of doubt deeper and deeper into my mind. I no longer know if Gale really loved me, or if I was just a part of some secret rebel plan of his. I can't even trust my own dreams anymore.

Apparently, I've been _hijacked_. I don't know what to believe. I don't know how I feel. I don't know what's real or not real.

"Are you okay?" Peeta asks.

I roll over numbly and say nothing.

The next day in the cafeteria, just as I'm just about to swallow my daily handful of pills, Haymitch appears over my shoulder. He reaches down and closes his fist over mine, trapping the medication inside.

"I don't know what that doctor's prescribing you, Sweetheart," he says, his tone serious for a change, "but it's not working."

I turn and stare at him for a moment before letting my fingers go loose. He pries the pills out of my grasp and roughly shoves them into his pocket as he walks away.

* * *

Three days later, with the medication working its way out of my bloodstream, I start feeling things again.

And I fall apart.

I've just woken up from a mid-afternoon nap - my previous night's sleep having been plagued by tremors, sweating and other withdrawal symptoms - and decide to take a shower before supper. A new kind of foam soap emerges from the dispenser this time, though. It smells faintly of oranges. I immediately have a flashback to the day Gale and I ran from District Twelve and collapse right there on the shower floor.

It's Peeta who finds me there a while later, shivering and crying against the cold, wet tile. I'm not sure how much time has passed, but the water has automatically turned itself off, having hit its daily ration limit. I hadn't even noticed.

"Katniss?" he asks, opening the shower door. I cry harder. I cry for Prim, who died without me there to protect her. For my mother, who I now wish I'd mended my relationship with. For having no home and no father to keep _me_ safe when I'd needed it most. For the guilt of what I did to Peeta and everyone else after I ran. For the unfairness of the games, which started this whole mess. For Gale's precious baby, lying in a pool of blood and dirt where it never should've been, the image of it burned into my mind. But mostly I cry for losing Gale and simply not knowing what happened to the most important person to me. I want our cabin and our lake and our hammock and our silly, stupid chess games and snowball fights back. I want him back. I want them all back.

Peeta wraps me up in a big, white towel and then guides me to the bed, where he tucks me in between the sheets.

"I'll be right back," he says, returning a moment later with a warm mug of the milk I enjoy so much.

_Thank you_, I start to say, but as soon as I open my mouth another round of sobbing begins.

Peeta sits on the bed and holds me until the tears let up. He rubs my back and soothes me, telling me that it's okay to miss them. But he never once says that everything's going to be alright.

I appreciate that. Peeta knows how it feels, and that it's not alright. He doesn't lie to me.


	24. Chapter 24: Doubt

**Chapter 24: Doubts**

Over the next few weeks, Peeta helps me mourn for the people I loved. And although I'm still plagued with uncertainties, I slowly start to come back to myself. At one point in the cafeteria, I even threaten Haymitch with my fork. It initially stuns him into silence, but then makes him guffaw in laughter.

Yup. Definitely coming back to myself.

Peeta tells me that my mother and Prim moved back into our old house in the Seam after I 'died', but that he and everyone else had made sure that they were taken care of. The Hawthornes, too, managed to get by without Gale. Even Haymitch supposedly brought groceries to both families on occasion when he was in town to buy his white liquor. He can barely take care of himself, so I wasn't expecting that one. But I suppose even Haymitch has a soft spot, and being reassured that Prim was looked after comforts me.

Peeta has started making a memory scrapbook based on some advice given to him when he had been lost in grief, and he pulls it out one day. He shows me some of the sketches he's drawn of his loved ones, and the lists of facts he's recorded about them within the book's pages. There's one dedicated to each person he's lost.

"This is my brother's page," he muses, fingering the edge of the pencil portrait. _Wrestling in the yard_ is listed underneath the heading _Favorite Memories_, right beside it.

"It's a good picture," I say, admiring his work.

I want to ask to see my page, but Peeta doesn't offer and I don't pry.

"We could do one for Prim," he softly suggests a moment later. "And for your mother. And Gale… if you wanted to."

I think about this for a while.

"Not for Gale," I finally decide. Because even though I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about him anymore, deep down I'm not ready to give up on the hope that he might still be alive. "But maybe... for our baby?" I add.

Peeta nods. I didn't say _the _baby, but_ our_ baby. He's the only one who I've really talked to about it, or any of the details of what life in the cabin was like. He laughs at the memories that make me smile and listens seriously when I talk about the difficult ones, and he keeps a respectful distance from what he knows I shared with Gale and Gale alone. Like our baby.

Maybe I could even ask him to draw the cabin. And Blue Lake.

"I could try that," he answers.

I hadn't realized that I'd said that last part aloud.

He tears a piece of paper from a different sketchbook and picks up a pencil, and then we sit on the bed together, cross-legged.

"It had cliffs on either side," I direct, watching him draw. "And evergreen trees. And the lake was like a shiny blue piece of glass."

"Like this?" Peeta asks, sketching a basic shape.

"Not as round," I correct. He erases one edge and tries again.

In the end, Peeta's sketch of the Blue Lake is almost exact, or at least as exact as it can get based on my clumsy description. He even adds a hammock between two of the trees near its shore. I hold it in my hands for a long time, trying not to let my tears smudge it, then fold it up and put it under my pillow. In the morning, I reach underneath to touch the rough paper there, and I almost feel closer to home.

To Gale.

The next day, we begin Prim's portrait. I'm steeling myself for the tears that will inevitably come with it, but then Peeta says something that catches me off guard.

"Don't think of her as _gone,_" he murmurs, deep in thought while shading with his pencil. "It's just like a long sleep. That's what Posy Hawthorne said to Prim at your funeral."

I'm stunned. Posy. Prim. _My_ funeral. Peeta briefly glances up at my reaction, but continues shading as he explains.

"Her mother told her that you and Gale were just sleeping, so that's what she told everyone else. ...It really does help, though."

And it does. Because if I can think that Prim is just sleeping, I can almost believe that she's safe and happy and I haven't really failed her - and that maybe, someday, we will wake up to each other once again.

* * *

A few days and a few completed pages later, Peeta walks into our compartment and gives me a strange look. I'm sitting on the bed, running the string of pearls that Gale gave me back and forth across my lips, remembering when his lips had been in their place. My eyes are swollen and red from crying.

"You missed supper again," Peeta remarks, drawing me out of my melancholy trance. Even though I'm finally processing my grief, I'm still not eating or sleeping very easily. My skin is sallow and my weight has been steadily declining, yet again. No one seems to take notice of my failure to thrive except for Peeta and Haymitch, who know me well enough to see that my livelihood is in being outdoors, not shut up underground.

But most of all - the part I don't tell anyone - is that I'm still plagued with doubt. Doubt about my own feelings and perceptions, and whether or not Gale truly loved me or just tricked me and saw my family as collateral damage in his own little rebellion. I should be making progress, but the unresolved questions keep pulling me back.

Peeta hands me a tissue and looks at me for a long time.

"You need to go back," he finally states.

"What?" I ask, unsure if I heard him correctly. Peeta's eyes are sad, but he reads me like a book.

"You need to go back. To the forest. To Gale."

"But-" I start, suddenly paranoid for some odd reason, like we shouldn't be having this conversation. Dr. Aurelius seems to think that Gale had alterior motives. "But I don't even know… for sure, if Gale… if I was just part of his _plan_-"

"Katniss," Peeta says firmly, bringing me back to my senses. "He wouldn't have begged us to save your life if he didn't love you. That's not part of any plan."

His words jar me. Because he's perfectly right.

In some ways, Peeta Mellark knows me better than I know myself.

He gets up and starts rummaging through one of his drawers with his back to me. Suddenly, I'm curious as to exactly how well Peeta knows me.

"Peeta..." I begin carefully.

"Hmm?"

"Can I see your page about me? In your memory book?"

He pauses, then closes the drawer, but he doesn't turn to face me.

Finally, he answers, "You don't have a page."

"How come?" I sputter. Granted, I'm alive so it shouldn't even matter, but I'm still surprised. I thought I had meant something to him, at least back then. "Why not?" I ask, again.

Peeta sighs.

"Because I was never really, entirely convinced that you were dead, Katniss."

I'm not sure if Peeta means that he loved me so much that he never accepted it, or if he means that he suspected Gale and I of running off all along. Maybe it's a little of both. But that night, though it's long overdue, Peeta cries and I'm the one who comforts him.

"You were right," I say softly, curling my body up against his back and holding him in my arms. "I was just sleeping."


	25. Chapter 25: Reconnaissance

**Chapter 25: Reconnaissance**

When Peeta had said that I needed to go back to the forest, I thought he was just stating the obvious because of my poor health.

But now it seems that he's actually serious about making it happen. He's convinced that if I could just get outside for a little while – just to breathe in the clean air and feel the last of the warm autumn sunshine on my skin – I would start to feel better.

It's all because I relapsed into a bad bout of depression after being informed that my request for a recovery mission for Gale had been denied. I'd wandered the halls until I found a utility closet, then curled up next to a dirty mop bucket and cried until I passed out from exhaustion. When the door was finally flung open, flooding the small space with abrasive, fluorescent light, Peeta and Haymitch were standing there. Haymitch simply gave an indiscernible snort and walked away, but Peeta seemed to be deep in thought. He offered me his hand and walked me back to our compartment, where he'd tucked me into bed. And that's where I've been ever since.

I think Peeta figures that I need to get back out into the forest in order to properly say goodbye. I only half agree. Because I do want to go back; I just don't want to say goodbye.

"Can't she just pop her little head up above the surface right here?" Haymitch points out after Peeta mentions his idea over lunch one day. "Twenty minutes in some radioactive outdoor compound won't kill her. She's only used up three or four of her nine lives."

It's the first time I've been out of bed in a while, but I muster up the energy to shoot him a deep glare.

Peeta just casually pushes a chunk of potato around on his plate. It's slathered in a gelatinous, colorless gravy. "No. It wouldn't be the same as actually being out _in_ the forest. We'll need a hovercraft."

Haymitch loosens his belt then rubs the scruff on his chin. He seems annoyed. "I'll see what I can do. Though I'm not sure if I can convince Coin to spend any extra resources on _her_," he adds gruffly, nodding in my direction.

Alma Coin is the leader of District Thirteen. I've never actually spoken to the woman – I've only recently been declared mentally competent by the medical team, although still severely depressed – but I'm told that she came to see me in the hospital when I was first rescued to see what all the fuss was about. Obviously, she didn't think much of the broken, sick girl that she encountered because I haven't seen her since.

In other words, we already don't like each other.

"But if she wants me to continue making the broadcasts," Peeta interjects, "then she might want to consider doing it for my sake. Since _she_," a nod at me, "is my _fiancé, _after all."

Haymitch narrows his eyes, then abruptly leaves the table. He knows very well that our engagement is a joke, even if most everyone else still seems to believe it, but I'm at a loss when it comes to explaining his odd reaction.

It's almost like he and Peeta were speaking in code.

Haymitch, I've learned, was part of a secret alliance of victors and sympathetic, powerful Capitol residents who wanted to overthrow Snow and his government all along. Growing up, we had been taught that District Thirteen had been obliterated by an atomic bomb during the Dark Days, and it was held up as an example of what would happen if the districts dared to question the Capitol's authority. But, as it turns out, a remnant of the people from Thirteen survived the nuclear holocaust and began living underground to avoid the residual radiation levels. And they wanted to see the Capitol fall, too. So Thirteen became the perfect secret location for Rebel headquarters. Now Haymitch is some kind of advisor to Coin, providing eyewitness information for her troops that only victors would have, mostly regarding the inner workings of the Capitol and Snow's policies.

Peeta, however, never knew about Haymitch's secret dealings and felt manipulated into his role in the rebellion, which explains why there's some tension between them. He hadn't even known of the secret Rebel alliance until District Twelve was already up in flames.

Hell, I never knew about the alliance, either. If I had, maybe Gale and I wouldn't have run. Maybe things would've ended up differently. I can understand Peeta's sense of betrayal.

From what I gather, life in Twelve had grown significantly harder in the months after Gale and I had left. The food that was supposed to come on parcel day arrived spoiled and full of maggots; a new head peacekeeper was brought in and public whippings once again became common practice. Things like that contributed to the uprising against the Capitol. And the uprising lead to the bombing of the district.

Peeta has always hated violence, and although he admits that a rebellion was probably the only way to free people from the increasingly oppressive conditions, it's the ultimate outcome – not the fighting – that he focuses on.

"I just keep telling myself," Peeta says passionately, once we're alone, "that once this war is over, everyone in Panem will be a lot better off."

His perspective, unfortunately, is not always in line with what Coin wants him to do, which makes his job here in Thirteen rather difficult. That's because they've harnessed his beautiful, persuasive speaking skills in order to make him the voice of their cause.

They call him_ The Mockingjay_ - a sort of slap in the face to the Capitol.

Peeta hates the Capitol and their excess as much as anyone. I know that from the Victory Tour. But he also dislikes having to spew the propaganda the Rebels give him to read out over the airwaves. He thinks that much of it is needless and only provokes more violence, which won't really help to win the war and end the suffering. But at least he can use his role as the Mockingjay to get what he wants.

And today, he wants access to a hovercraft.

* * *

"Okay, kid. I got you your pass," Haymitch grunts when Peeta answers our compartment door. He flashes a shiny, plastic card. "You have two hours. The crew is waiting."

Peeta nods in appreciation as Haymitch drops the card into his hand and walks away. Then he casually tells me to get ready as he slips on his standard issue jacket.

Instead, I flop facedown into a pillow and make no move to go anywhere. I'm just not sure if I can pull myself together enough to do this today. Peeta hurls a sweater at me and it lands on the back of my head.

"Get up. You'll feel better once we're out there."

I grudgingly pull myself up and slip the oversized sweater over my head. It's like a tent. I could hide out in it.

"I don't feel well," I moan, slumping back down into a fetal position, pulling the collar up over my head. It's hot under the thick fabric. "I just want to go back to sleep."

"That's exactly why we're going," Peeta says in a low voice. There's an edge to his words, although I can't exactly tell why. Not without being able to see his expression. Is he mad at me? "Come on. Get up," he says impatiently, tugging the sweater down to expose my face.

Peeta is being uncharacteristically pushy and insensitive today. I blink and spit out a mouthful of hair.

"Will you quit telling me what to do?" I snap.

"Katniss," Peeta says, his whole demeanor suddenly changing. "We're going to look for Gale."

For a moment, I'm too stunned to reply. Then I slowly sit up.

"What?"

"You're not okay," Peeta explains, his blue eyes pained. "I can't stand to watch you like this. You're not going to be okay until we find him. So we will. Dead or alive. Haymitch is covering for us but we don't have much time, so, come on. Hurry up."

Haymitch?

"Why would Haymitch cover for us?" I ask. Didn't he deceive Peeta all along?

Peeta grabs my hands and pulls me to my feet.

"It's a victor thing. Coin wouldn't understand. Let's go."

* * *

Once we're on the hovercraft, I'm a nervous wreck.

"... And we're going to check the last place any transmission was sent from," Peeta tells the crew, giving them instructions.

"No!" I interrupt.

"No?" Peeta inquires. They all turn to face me.

"He wouldn't be there," I say, without adding _if he's alive_. Maybe if he's dead he'd be in the last place he radioed from, but not if he's alive. Gale is smart, and he's outwitted the Capitol once before, so I have hope that he's still out there. I'm not going to waste my time looking for a body.

"Where should we go, then?"

The first place I'd look would be the cabin at Blue Lake. The only problem is, I have no idea where it is. I don't know how Gale got us there from District Twelve.

"Katniss?"

I only know of one place in relation to Blue Lake that might have a teeny, tiny chance of actually be found on an old map of Panem, before it was called Panem. If we could locate it, I would know how to get back to the cabin.

"The farmhouse."


	26. Chapter 26: Saying Goodbye

**Saying Goodbye**

What are the odds that you will be able to locate a hundred-year-old farmhouse on a hundred-year-old map, when all that you know is that it's a few hours walk from a small lake, and possibly a few days walk from District Twelve?

Let me tell you, the odds are _not_ in your favor.

After spending the better part of an hour searching, we still haven't found anything on the map. It seems that we're just wasting time, flying around aimlessly. Trying to keep my growing sense of hopelessness at bay, I curl myself up near one of the hovercraft's long, angled windows and stare at the trees going by below as Peeta continues to scour the available information for clues.

Then something in the distance catches my eye.

"What's that?" I ask, peering. "It looks like smoke. A lot of it."

Peeta looks up from the map and joins me at the window.

"Maybe you should sit over here," he suggests, trying to guide me away.

That's when I realize I'm looking at the smoldering remains of District Twelve. It looks like it's been freshly bombed, but that's only because the mines must still be burning underground. If a mine fire has hit a coal seam, it can continue to burn out of control for hundreds of years, making the whole area completely uninhabitable.

Everything is covered in ghostly white ash. All their bodies are buried out there.

I'm looking at a mass grave.

I suddenly turn my head and get sick all over the floor. Peeta holds me up.

"I don't think I can do this," I weep afterwards.

"Yes you can," Peeta reassures me, although he looks a little pale, himself. "Gale's not in there, remember? Here. Drink this and then help me keep looking."

Finally, when I feel almost beyond hope, we locate the area where a small town named Belleville once stood. The rural acreages were surrounded by fertile farmland and orchards. And Peeta figures it would be only a few days walk north-east of Twelve, if you weren't following an exactly straight route. I glue myself to the window and nearly scream when we begin to fly over dilapidated rooftops.

"Here! I think this is it! Stop here!" I shout, heading for the electric ladder.

I don't even hear what Peeta is saying until I'm knee-high in the same itchy, dry grass in front of the same collapsing farmhouse that Gale and I had made love in. My heart feels like it's going to pound right out of my chest.

"Katniss, did you hear me?"

"This is it!" I say, almost delirious with joy. "Now we just have to walk-"

"Katniss. We only have twenty minutes," Peeta calls out behind me, catching up. "Do you think you can tell us the way to the cabin from here if we take the hovercraft?"

I look around. Things are even more overgrown than they were when I was last at the farm, which was over a year ago. It looks different. Even I am having trouble remembering the exact path that Gale and I had taken, and I'm standing right where we had been.

I realize with a sinking feeling that there's no way I'd be able to indicate the route from above.

"I need more time," I say.

"We don't have more time-"

"Just give me a minute!" I yell frantically. _Think, think. Okay. We went back into the woods, and then we followed a stream most of the way…_

Peeta is standing in front of me now. He raises his eyebrows and I break into anxious gasps.

"I need to walk it," I ultimately say. "I need to walk it to figure it out."

His face falls.

"That will take hours," he says quietly. And we only have twenty more minutes with the hovercraft.

My vision becomes blurry as panic-induced tears start to well up in my eyes.

"But- I- I need," I stammer. "But- Peeta!..."

Suddenly his warm hands are on my shoulders, steadying me.

"Go on. Go. Get out of here," he says in an urgent voice.

"What?" I sputter in disbelief.

"Go find him."

I reflexively take a step back, then pause and stare into Peeta's eyes. He's on the verge of tears, himself.

"Peeta…" I start, but I choke up. He's letting me go. He's the closest thing I have to family and I am the closest thing to his. He's been my best friend in Thirteen. Maybe my only friend. He's gotten me through so much. And now he's letting me go.

I feel like I'm being wrenched in two.

"I can't leave you," I begin to cry, grabbing his hand and clinging to him. I can't do it again. "Come with me, please come with me," I beg.

Peeta refuses to blink and grits his teeth, trying to be strong, but tears drip out of his bloodshot eyes anyways. He looks straight over my shoulder, towards the woods in the distance.

"I can't. Coin would…" He shakes his head a bit, disturbed by the thought. "Go. I'll come back to find you both when I can. I promise."

"No, I won't leave you! I'm not a coward!" I blubber.

"You think I don't know that? Go!"

"I can't!"

"You have to. You would do it for me. We look out for each other. It's what we do, right?"

"Right," I say, but I'm crying so badly that I'm barely intelligible. Peeta draws me close and hugs me hard.

"Go, Katniss. Please? Go," he chokes into my ear.

Weeping, I grab Peeta's face in both hands and kiss him on the lips. His hands find my hips and he kisses me back. Then he breaks away and gives me a little push.

"Go."

I slowly start to walk backwards, not wanting to take my eyes off him. Finally, when the distance between us is so great that I can no longer make out the expression on his face, the hovercraft appears in the cloudy, grey sky above and lifts him up.

I have a brief flashback of the arena.

And then Peeta is gone.

I stand alone for a long time and let my tears carelessly drip onto my sweater. The only sound is the lonely wind whipping winding trails through the tall grasses around me.


	27. Chapter 27: The Storm

**Chapter 27: The Storm**

I'm left with the image of Peeta being lifted up into the hovercraft burned into my mind.

I feel more alone than ever.

It's beginning to rain, but there's no way that I'm stopping anywhere for cover between here and the cabin, because I need to get home. I need to get to Gale.

So I pick the direction that I think we headed in the last time we left the farm and jog through the swishing grasses, into a dense grouping of trees, until I find the stream that we had followed home. It must've been a particularly rainy autumn so far, because unlike the tame, clear trickle that Gale and I had splashed in, it's now rushing violently with dirty water and threatening to overflow its banks in some areas.

The rain has become a full on downpour now, and I'm only slightly protected from it by the thick covering of leaves and branches above. Mud clots to the soles of my shoes, making them leaden and clumsy. All I can do is take one soggy sleeve, push back the wet hair that's stuck to my forehead and keep walking.

I find myself experiencing a sort of tunnel vision. All I can think is _I've got to get home to Gale, I've got to get home to Gale._ It becomes a chant, mixed with the dull, drumming roar of the rainfall, driving me forward at a quicker pace. At one point I become so lost in it that I take a wrong turn and, frustratingly, need to backtrack to find the broken curve of the stream once again.

Periodically, I'm wracked with fear. What if I get to the cabin only to find Gale's limp, lifeless body? What will I do? Have I made a terrible mistake in leaving Peeta, the only person whose existence I am still sure of? In these moments, my blood runs cold and my body moves stiffly, but I force it to keep plodding forward.

I'd always figured that not knowing the fate of the people Gale and I had left behind after we'd run away was the worst of the ghosts that haunted me. Worse than the arena, even. But now I _know_ they are dead, and I still don't feel any better. The guilt and the grief has been overwhelming, and Peeta has helped me manage as best he could, but that cloying, haunting uncertainty will never really leave me alone until I find out what happened to Gale. Or until I die. Whichever comes first.

Peeta was right - I need Gale in order to be okay. I'm not okay without him.

_Come home,_ Gale had said, holding me safely in his arms when I'd been standing on the edge of that cliff. He had been crying, broken without me, too. _Come home to me._

I swallow the lump in my throat and walk faster. _I've got to get home to-_

Just then, the waterlogged riverbank crumbles beneath my feet and I suddenly drop straight down. Muddy water rushes over my shoes and climbs up my legs as the ground that was below me just a second ago disintegrates almost instantly. Freezing waves slap against my thighs, pulling the lower half of my body into the strong current. I instinctively throw my arms out, clawing at handfuls of earth to keep from being swept away. Water soaks into my hair and sprays up into my face, leaving me choking and sputtering. Digging my fingers and elbows into the ground, I manage to heave myself out of the raging mess and roll onto what remains of the muddy bank.

I lie there on my back for a moment, gasping, with my frozen fingers balled up inside the soaked, dirty sweater that Peeta had insisted I wear earlier this afternoon.

Of all the people I expected to have to say goodbye to in the forest today, he was not one of them.

Sharp drops of rain slice into my face, numbing it.

"Gale," I finally sob, breaking down and shivering violently as the burst of adrenaline wears off. "Gale."

After I stop crying and tell myself to get it together because I _have_ to do this – just like Gale had said to me when we'd first come into the woods - I roll over and haul myself back to my feet. I can't feel my body at all anymore, and I'm still not entirely sure of where I am. But I keep going, hoping beyond hope that I will soon see something familiar.

And I do.

Blue Lake, silent and still but for the rain ricocheting off its mirrored surface, is suddenly spread out before me.

"Gale!" I yell, breaking into a run in the direction of the cabin. "Gale!"

The storm is deafeningly loud and accompanied by the occasional roll of thunder and flash of sheet lightning. He wouldn't be able to hear me. But I call out to him anyways. "Gale!"

There's the cabin. It's still standing. It looks the same. It's there.

"_Gale!_"

I'm out of breath. There's no smoke coming from the chimney. But that's okay. That doesn't have to mean anything.

"_Gale!_" I scream again, hoarse.

I throw my body into the wooden door without even thinking of making a more tactful entrance, and it heaves open with a loud crack.

Inside, the cabin is dark. There's no fire in the hearth. The blanket on the bed is rumpled, as it always has been. And the jug of flowers that had sat next to me throughout my illness remains in the same spot, untouched. Each bloom has dried out, as if frozen in time.

"Gale?" I ask quietly, to no one in particular, standing completely still inside the doorway.

Droplets of water fall from my eyelashes and off the tip of my nose, but there's no other movement.

Numbly, I make my way over to the bed and sink down onto it, sitting stiffly for a moment, then crumpling sideways. I bury my face into the blanket and inhale the remnant of Gale's scent. My heart squeezes in pain, but the rest of me is unresponsive. There are no tears left to cry.

What am I supposed to do now?

"Come home to me," I say softly, staring blankly out the open door and into the storm that rages just beyond it.


	28. Chapter 28: The Dream

**Chapter 28: The Dream**

It's getting darker. The storm still hasn't let up, and my teeth are chattering.

I eventually force myself to get up, close the door and build a fire. My hands are clumsy and out of practice as I pile the wood, but I still manage to light a clump of the dried grass that Gale and I had saved for kindling. I shove it beneath the stacked wood before the flames can singe my fingers. Once the fire is roaring, I take off all of my clothes and hang them to dry - just as I'd always done - then sit and curl my knees up to my chest. In some ways, I feel like I'm home. I can almost trick myself into thinking that Gale is just outside and will come through the door at any minute.

But as time goes by and the fire dies down, he doesn't.

"Come home to me," I whisper, just to keep myself sane. I repeat it over and over as I wrap myself up in the blanket that smells like him. I'm exhausted, but I can't sleep.

I add another log to the fire to keep it going. To keep myself going.

* * *

_The cabin is caving in._

I must be dreaming. I don't recall falling asleep, but I must be, I must. But even knowing that doesn't make escaping the horror around me any easier. It's just like the dreams I used to have on the train, the ones I could hardly shake myself out of.

The log walls are creaking and moaning under the stress of the violent storm blowing outside. I'm filled with dread each time the wood lurches. The wind increases, building to a frightening strength until it roars down the chimney and extinguishes the fire, blowing snowy white ash over everything Gale and I shared together.

Burying it, just like District Twelve.

"No!" I cry, watching as it's all erased.

Another powerful gust of wind blows the door open and slams it into the wall with a bang so loud that it makes me jump.

I startle awake, sweating and tangled in the blanket, still lying on the floor in front of the fire. Breathlessly, I roll onto my stomach and sit up to see that the door really has flown open, only not from the wind.

From Gale.

Gale. Standing there in the doorway. Wet clothes caked with mud. Game bag slung over his shoulder. Staring at me in wordless disbelief. _Gale._

_Am I still dreaming?_

His hair is longer and the whites of his eyes stand out in contrast to his dirty skin. He seems thinner than I remember. I try to say his name, but my breath catches in my throat. Finally, he's the one to break the silence.

"Are you really alive?" he asks tentatively, as if I'm an animal that will be scared away.

"Are you?" I choke.

He drops the game bag and before I know it, his lips come crashing down on mine.

"Gale," I cry as he kisses me. "I was so- I thought that-" but I can't form a full sentence. My eyes overflow with tears of relief.

Gale kisses me and kisses me and keeps on kissing me, his big, calloused hands smoothing over my cheeks and down my shoulders. The blanket falls from my body and he squeezes my naked ribcage, drawing me closer to himself. He's warm and solid. I can't believe this is real.

_Gale is alive._

I weave my fingers into his hair, then scrape my nails down his back possessively. Gale is mine, and I am his. We collapse in a heap of pulling and kissing and grabbing, right there on the floor with the door wide open.

"Katniss!" he gasps in disbelief. "Katniss!"

Our lips fuse together once again.

"You said you would never leave me," I cry, breaking away and hitting him in the chest.

Then I pull him close and kiss him again, hungrily.

"You promised!" I sob into his mouth, pushing roughly at his shoulder. "You promised!"

Another passionate kiss. He gently bites my lower lip as I clutch his face between my hands and cry.

"Oh god, Katniss, you're alive," he says in awe, tears running down his own face. It's then that I notice that he's trembling.

"Gale," I sob, digging my fingers into his hair and pulling his lips back down onto mine. He makes a muffled noise and cradles my head, returning the kiss with the same sense of urgency and relief that I feel. Our tears mix together on my cheeks.

"I love you," I gasp against his lips, still clinging. And I never want to let him go.

Gale breathes my name again and again, peppering me with kisses as if he still can't believe that I'm really there in his arms. His warm, soft lips find the shell of my ear and the outline of my collarbone. His hands splay out across my back as he runs his hot tongue between my bare breasts and over the place on my neck where my heartbeat pulses frantically. I claw at his shirt, scrunching it up, shoving my palms beneath the fabric in desperation to feel more of his warm skin against mine. Gale lifts himself up and yanks the garment off, tossing it aside. We both reach for the button on his pants at the same time, and he kicks them aside as he crawls back on top of me. I spread my legs and wrap my arms around his back, pulling him flat against my body.

He rests his hand over my heart to feel it beating.

"Katniss," he breathes again. "I love you, too."

Gale circles his forearms above my head, making me feel completely surrounded by him. His lips connect with mine once again, and in the same moment he pushes himself into my body. It takes a few seconds for him to sink in, given that my muscles haven't accommodated his length in so long. He groans into my mouth, then begins to pulse slightly inside of me. I wrap my legs around his waist and lock my heels together, angling my hips upward to bring him in deeper. For a while we make no calculated moves, only responding instinctually to the need to be as close to one another as possible.

"Yes," I breathe, almost in relief that he's once again a part of me. I've needed this. _This_ is home.

I begin to thrust my hips a little, feeling him slide in and out. Gale squeezes his eyes shut and tilts his head back, exhaling roughly. I take advantage of his exposed neck to lick my way up his throat and over his adam's apple. His mouth falls open and he moans - I feel it rumble beneath my lips. After that, he begins to move in earnest, meeting each of my thrusts with his own. The friction created between our bodies makes my nipples harden and ache with delight. I dig my fingernails into his back and tighten my embrace just to hold on as his pace increases.

"Oh, Katniss, oh," he pants into my ear, his hands sliding down my frame and up my thighs, gripping them tightly and pushing them up against either side of my body. He rests his head on my shoulder, fanning my neck with hot bursts of breath, teasing the spot within me that he knows makes me buck against him uncontrollably.

"Don't leave me again," I choke out.

"I'll won't," he breathes. "I can't. I can't."

"Don't ever-" I start to tell him, but I'm cut off by a shuddering, inward gasp as his fingers slip between my thighs to feel the spot where our bodies are connected. I nearly climax right then and there, but I'm determined to wait for him.

"You're so wet," he whispers into my shoulder, pressing his fingers against my swollen, sensitive bud. I feel my muscles clench around him in response. Only Gale can elicit this reaction from me. He moans in appreciation and cups my bottom, giving me a few particularly hard thrusts. I cry out and grab the back of his neck wildly, nearly losing control.

"Gale," I whimper. "Please, please. I'm gonna... I'm..."

"You're gonna come?" he finishes, hovering above, searching my face and cataloguing each reaction.

"Yes," I gasp. "But... but not without you."

"Ah," he moans, almost as if in pain. He knows what it means.

It means I forgive him.

With that, our lips join once more. Gale increases the intensity of his movements and we cleave to each other, pulling one another over the edge at the same time.

Afterwards, he remains inside of me and slides his palm protectively over my belly.

"I'd do anything for you," he says.

"I know." It's the truth.


	29. Chapter 29: Together

**Chapter 29: Together**

_A/n: This chapter's events were inspired by the Appalachian storm of 1950, which caused record snowfall and low temperatures across 22 states and claimed the lives of over 350 people._

* * *

When I awake, Gale's arms are still wrapped around me. He's still asleep, breathing deeply and lying on top of my hair.

We had made love last night, over and over again, until our bodies were drenched with sweat and both of us were delirious from exhaustion. It had taken until the third time – sucking on his fingers as I'd straddled him – for me to realize that it really wasn't a dream.

"Real or not real?" I'd asked breathlessly just to make sure, holding his palm up to my lips and kissing it.

"Real, real," Gale had groaned, driving up into me.

Afterwards, sleep had come easily. We'd ignored the cabin door, which had clumsily been kicked closed at some point but had never been properly latched shut. The wind must've picked up again while we slept, because it's wide open now and I'm now staring out onto a blank canvas of spiraling snowflakes.

The cold woke me up.

It's unseasonably early for a snowfall this heavy and for temperatures to be this low. Then again, the stream had been flooding pretty badly yesterday as well, and I'd never seen it like that before, either.

I shiver in Gale's embrace and I realize no amount of fire created between our bodies, physically, will be able to refine us, to erase the damage this war has done. I graze my fingertips over a tight, red scar on his upper arm that wasn't there before, and I know that even more lie beneath his skin. As do scars of my own.

I dread it, but we'll have to talk, and soon.

I reluctantly pry myself away from his sleeping form just long enough to shut the door and stoke the embers of the fire, adding more kindling and wood. Crouching in front of the flames as they crackle back to life, I hear Gale stir behind me. I've decided that the most important thing, before anything else, is to tell him about our families. I just don't know how to say it.

"That's what brought me back here," Gale yawns, startling me out of my thoughts.

"Hmm?"

"The smoke. From the chimney. I saw it and knew you were here." He stretches his legs and turns the blanket down. "It'd only ever be you. Come back to bed. It's cold."

I crawl in next to Gale and gratefully accept his offer of the blanket and body heat, wedging my icy feet in between his legs. He moans and tucks the blanket around my shoulders, pulling me close. I can feel that he's hard yet again, but neither of us have the energy to do anything about it.

"I found my way back from the farmhouse," I explain. "Peeta and I found it on an old map. We had a hovercraft-"

I stop abruptly. I had just been about to start on District Thirteen and Haymitch and Coin when I'd remembered my resolution. I have to tell Gale about his family first. No stalling, no secrets, not like before. I swallow hard and nuzzle into his chest, trying to find the words and preparing myself mentally for the grief that will follow.

"Gale?"

"Shhh," he says, combing his fingers through my hair. It's even longer than before.

"But I need to tell you something," I choke, drawing a shuddery breath. "I saw District Twelve. Our… our families- _your_ family..."

"I know," he says quietly, cutting me off.

"But you don't," I protest. When I look up, I see that his eyes are filled with tears. He continues to absentmindedly sift my hair through his fingers as he stares off into space.

"Yes," he finally says. "I do."

And he does. He's figured it out before I've had the chance to say much of anything, just as always. I kiss away his tears and hold him close for a long while, tucking my head back underneath his chin and hoping he feels comforted by everything I'm not saying.

_It's just us out here. We're all we've got now._ Gale's words are more true now than ever.

"Did you bury him? …Or her?" I suddenly ask. Our baby.

Gale nods slowly above me. He knows what I'm asking.

"Under the tree. Near the hammock."

"Good," I whisper after a long silence. It's the spot I would've chosen, too.

Suddenly, Gale scoots down a bit and meets my eye. He looks pained.

"I'm sorry," he pleads softly. "Katniss, I'm so sorry for-"

But this time, it's my turn to cut him off.

"Don't do that," I tell him, then press my lips to his, refusing to let him blame himself anymore - for my sickness, for the miscarriage, for any of it. I know what that's like all too well.

I gently maneuver him onto his back and then begin to kiss my way down his chest, as if his guilt is a venom that I can suck out of his skin. I drag my tongue over his nipples and he exhales, cupping the back of my head. I want to make him feel good, feel loved. But before I can move my mouth any lower, Gale stops me.

"And Peeta," he says in a strangled voice, betraying the question that has been on his mind, "Peeta... he- took care of you?"

I nod and kiss his stomach, but I know he feels ashamed to ask. For someone as passionate and capable as Gale, it must've frustrated him to go against his Seam sensibilities and have to ask for help after we'd done just fine for nearly two years.

Then I remember something, something only Peeta, of all people, had been able to tell me.

"He said you must've loved me a lot."

Gale smiles a little.

"I do," he answers, quietly. "I do love you a lot."

With that he releases me, and I slide further down his abdomen, taking him into my mouth.

Gale and I spend the rest of the day communicating what needs to be said in our own, broken sort of way. Partly words, partly action, and partly just knowing.

* * *

That night the temperature plummets, so Gale and I layer on all the clothing we own. We no longer have the patchwork quilt that had been salvaged from the farmhouse - I'd been wrapped in it when I was picked up by the Rebels, and it's now somewhere back in District Thirteen - but I'm certain that even before we had two blankets, it had never been this cold.

We pile extra wood on the fire to heat the cabin, but the icy wind still whistles through the cracks in the walls and ceiling. It's so cold that we can see our breath on the air, even indoors.

Gale and I cling to each other underneath our sole blanket, but our bed feels like a block of ice and seems to leach away our body heat more than anything. We shove the pine-filled pallet closer to the fire and set it on top of the deer skin rug, risking the chance of it all catching on fire just so we can feel a little warmth. But it doesn't do much to help, in the end, since freezing gusts of air keep forcing their way down the little chimney.

"It'll let up by morning," Gale reassures me through chattering teeth. He forces me to take the spot closest to the fire and then presses himself against my back. "We can get more wood from the pile outside afterwards. I just wasn't expecting a storm like this."

He seems to be faring better than I am. Maybe I've just gotten used to the consistent temperature of the underground living compartments in District Thirteen. Or maybe it's just that Gale's brave. Every time the walls creak and lurch, I'm reminded of my nightmare about the cabin caving in and burying us alive. At one point there's a deafening, terrifying crash, so loud that it shakes the ground beneath us. My first thought is _bomb_, but Gale presses his face into my hair when I yelp and reassures me that it was just a tree collapsing with the force of the wind. It's still frightening, though, how near it came to crushing us.

I barely sleep.

When what I guess to be morning rolls around, the fire is nearly out and it's so cold that frost covers the interior walls of the cabin. Gale discovers that snow has drifted up against the door and ice has sealed it shut. We pile all the remaining wood and kindling we have onto the fire. Then we resort to removing all of our clothing except for the oversized sweater Peeta had given me, which Gale then puts on and I squeeze myself up the front of, so we're pressed skin to skin. Apparently, it's best that way to share body heat. We layer all our remaining clothes over the blanket on top of us, and for a while it seems to feel warmer.

* * *

The ice storm still hasn't let up.

Gale and I have been without a fire for at least a few hours. At first it was painfully cold, but now I barely notice it.

We're playing a game where we list hot things in order to pass the time and ward off our sleepiness.

"Summertime," I say. The first, obvious choice.

A pause.

"Greasy Sae's soup," Gale returns.

We both laugh a little, through tight jaws and chattering teeth.

"Lamb stew," I counter after a long pause. The one thing I liked about the Capitol.

"Toast," he answers.

"... Mint tea. With honey."

"Mmm... Corn on the cob."

"Yum," I sigh, closing my eyes and burrowing even closer to Gale. When was the last time we'd eaten? I can't get my brain to tell me, but I'm not hungry anymore. We've been shivering for so long that I barely notice it now.

"Thick blankets," I finally whisper.

The breaks between our answers are getting longer and longer as we grow drowsy.

"... Those gloves. With the fur lining."

"… A… um, a sunburn."

Silence.

"Gale? Your turn."

"Um... Hunting boots," he mumbles.

Another silence.

"...That bedroom. In the- the farmhouse," I say. It had been humid that day. We'd only made the air hotter with our lovemaking.

There's a long pause, and I think Gale has fallen asleep. I was going to ask him something about… something. There was a question, but I can't remember it now.

What did I need to say to him?

Something about Peeta coming back. A hovercraft? A promise? Something. My brain is in a fog, and I can't figure it out.

It doesn't matter. Gale's here. We're together. Everything's okay.

"Hey, Catnip," he says weakly, after a while. "Remember that sunset we- we watched? From the cliffs?"

His lips look a little blue. I kiss them shakily and keep mine hovering near his, even as I tremble.

My cheeks are numb. I can't feel my toes.

"Yeah," I answer, recalling the orange and pink and purple, the treetops and clouds and sky that stretched on to forever.

We'd watched the sun go down, cradled in each other's arms, just as we are now.

"Yeah, Gale. I remember."


	30. Epilogue

**Epilogue - A Drawing of a Lake**

_A drawing of a lake._

It was crazy, but it's what Peeta was counting on when he set out to find her. That the single sketch he'd drawn from her description - the one on the dog-eared piece of paper torn out of his sketchbook, which Katniss had delicately folded and tucked safely under her pillow - that _it_ would be enough to lead him back to her.

He had to find the Blue Lake. The drawing was all he had.

But then the storm had hit, sweeping across the eastern half of Panem. An _extratropical cyclone of a rare magnitude _as they had told him to say during one of his Mockingjay broadcasts.

Even deep beneath the surface of the earth, in the grave-like living quarters of District Thirteen, the wind and record-setting low temperatures had been causing problems. Uncontrollable power outages, bursting pipes, air intake filters blocked by ice and snow. Whole floors were deemed untenable and families had to move into emergency bunkers running on backup power sources. People spilled over into the corridors and slept on the floor.

For Peeta, though, the biggest problem was that the storm had grounded all hovercraft indefinitely. He anxiously spent hours waiting for the worst of the weather to pass, the sketch of the lake concealed in the pocket of his standard issue District Thirteen pants, praying to no god in particular that he wouldn't have to add another page to his memory book.

Not hers. Please, not hers.

Late nights in bed were the hardest on him. Lying there alone in the dark, Peeta could just faintly pick up on the wind whistling through the air vent in the wall above. The sound was haunting and far away, just like her. He wondered how violent the storm had to be on the surface for it to be audible so far below. He wondered if she had made it to the cabin and if she was safe inside, sheltered from all that wind.

He hoped so.

Sometimes, he would open her drawer in their living compartment and look at the few items she owned, just to feel some small bit of her lingering presence.

Hours of waiting turned into days. One morning over breakfast, Haymitch abruptly pulled out a chair and sat down beside him.

"Coin's asking about her," he said without making eye contact. "She wants to know where _she_ is."

It seemed that Coin was finally getting curious regarding the whereabouts of the Everdeen girl. Was she sick? Was she sane? After all, having the star-crossed lovers in Thirteen was a strategic advantage for her over and against Snow. Why else would she have allowed the girl to be rescued?

Peeta's stomach tightened.

He had suspected Coin's motives weren't sincere. Being the Mockingjay, he had access to some inside information, after all. And he wasn't about to let the rebel leader use Katniss like a pawn, like some piece in a game just to be tossed aside when she was no longer of any use.

"Did you tell her?" Peeta finally asked.

"Hell no," Haymitch spat, shoving his chair back to leave. "This is a victor thing."

No one can really pinpoint the exact moment when the Victor's Alliance was formed, but perhaps it was then. Everyone credits the group with bringing Alma Coin's war crimes to light - she was convicted after President Snow's assassination. But they say that Katniss Everdeen was, unknowingly, the spark behind the alliance that finally brought peace to the nation. They say that it was therefore love, not violence, which put and end to the civil war and birthed the Republic of Panem.

Because to let her go, Peeta Mellark must've loved her a lot.

* * *

"Find a water source," was all that his old mentor had said, just as he had when the boy and girl had both been tributes about to enter an arena.

That was all. _Find a water source._ Then he'd dropped the flight pass into Peeta's hands and walked away.

But Peeta understood; potable water meant survival, and Katniss was a survivor. So there she'd be.

After the storm had passed and hovercraft were once again cleared for flight, he gathered a small crew and formed a search and rescue party. Using the outdated map, the team landed at the same farmhouse as before. From there, Peeta took Haymitch's advice and followed the line of a freshwater stream into the nearby woods. He traveled on foot for hours over snow and ice, his prosthetic leg chafing uncomfortably from the physical exertion and low temperatures. But his determination won out over the conditions and drove him onwards.

Periodically, the team would stop and fan out, looking for the small, frozen lake that would've hardly been a speck on the map if its location had ever been recorded at all. It was during a small detour that Cpl. Boggs found one of Gale's makeshift shelters. It was too sparse to have been home to more than one person for even a few days, and it certainly wasn't the cabin Katniss had spoken of. But it was evidence to Peeta that Gale had survived in the woods after they'd rescued her, and that he had been moving from place to place, perhaps to avoid having his radio signals tracked by the Capitol.

Or, perhaps, Gale had been searching for District Thirteen. For her.

Peeta hoped that he'd found her before the storm had.

The team found nothing else that first time. Any evidence that may have indicated the route Katniss had taken had been erased by the elements. The landscape was too obscured by snow, ice and fallen debris to be recognizable, anyways.

It was only when the crew returned on a second attempt that they found the lake in the drawing.

It was frozen over. The cliffs that rose up on either side were blue against the chalky grey sky. The evergreen trees surrounding it dipped and bowed, weighed low by branches heavy-laden with hoarfrost. Everything was completely still and silent except for the squeak and crunch of the crew's regulation issue boots in the snow.

Several of the huge, old growth trees in the area had toppled over, too tall for their own root systems to hold them upright against the winds. It was next to one of these massive tangles of upturned roots, tied to a tree that was (miraculously) still standing, that Peeta discovered the shredded remains of a hammock. Above the frayed strands trailing from the tree's trunk he found three words, carved crooked and etched deep into the bark:

_Baby. Everdeen. Hawthorne._

He read and re-read the letters there for a long time, letting them sink in. Then he then gently ran his fingers over the words, understanding what they represented.

"Sir?" Boggs inquired, breaking the silence and walking up behind him.

Peeta turned and moved his body to shield the words, hiding the inscription. It seemed too personal for multiple pairs of eyes.

"Look nearby for a cabin," he told the crew, instead. "They're here."

* * *

For the man who would go on to lead the Republic of Panem with his great and beautiful words, Peeta Mellark was strangely silent the day that they found Katniss Everdeen.

He had said nothing when the cabin was finally located, only minutes from the tree with the inscription. He'd said nothing once the snow had been dug away and the door pried open, allowing the team access inside.

He'd said nothing when they'd entered the small room and found Katniss and Gale, there on the frozen cabin floor, holding each other tightly in front of the remains of a fire that had once been burning.

In silence, he knelt and pressed his fingers against each cold neck, searching for a pulse between the two of them.

Minutes ticked by.

The search and rescue crew kept their distance but shot him questioning looks, trying to establish whether or not they should approach to administer the first aid treatment for hypothermia.

But Peeta didn't look at the crew. He couldn't. He couldn't bear to look at anyone except Katniss. There was frost in her dark hair and the slightest ghost of a smile on her pale lips. Gale's arms were wrapped tightly around her, and hers around him.

They looked peaceful.

Eventually, Boggs cleared his throat.

"Sir?" he asked. "Sir, are they... is she dead?"

Peeta slowly withdrew his hand. An unreadable look crossed his face.

After a long time, he stiffly rose to his feet.

"Sir? Is she dead?" Boggs repeated.

Finally, at last, Peeta spoke.

"No," he answered. "No. Just sleeping."

_The End_


End file.
